Dark Passenger
by Deranged Black Kitten
Summary: Inspired by Dexter. The Santa Barbara Butcher is a cunning killer unlike anyone the SBPD has ever dealt with before. As the case progresses,Shawn is soon questioning his morals and Carlton is questioning reality. Just who is the hunter of this story?SLASH (Unhappy Ending)
1. Chapter One: Superior

_Greetings readers of fic! This story was inspired by the fandom Dexter. It's my first posted Psych fic, so be kind. It will be told from three different POVs. There will be third person POV for both Carlton and Shawn and anything told in first person POV is the killer's POV. Also, past events are italicized and will begin each chapter. _

_There might be slash, I haven't quite decided on that yet. Feel free to take a vote on whether or not you want slash to give me an idea as to which way the story could go._

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

** Chapter One: Superior**

Sometime in the past...

_It was completely unorganized. An absolute mess. The room had been painted red and body parts littered the ground like hunks of meat. There had been no method to this murder, simply a mindless slaughter, and for some reason that I couldn't quite understand, it disappointed me. I just had this odd feeling that for something like this, there should be some sort of order. Neater, cleaner, and well-thought out. _

_My gaze was drawn from the scene surrounding me to the man who stood before me. The man who was responsible for the mess. He unlocked me from my shackles and stared down at me for a long while, neither of us saying anything. He narrowed his eyes at me, as if wondering why I didn't start crying, wondering why I wasn't begging for my life the same way his previous victims had. _

_He could waste his time staring at me for as long as he wanted, he wasn't going to get a reaction out of me. It wasn't a self-righteous 'I won't give him the satisfaction of hearing me scream' thing, it was because he was beneath me. Despite being much younger and much shorter than him, I looked down on him. He wasn't a cold-blooded killer, he was merely an animal gnawing on a bloody carcass, and there was no point in begging to an animal, it wouldn't understand you anyway. _

_He must have seen something in me, something I couldn't see myself, because instead of brutally ending my life like all of his previous victims, he walked away, closing the door behind himself and leaving me there in the red room. _

_Alone. _

_For days and days…_

* * *

Present Day 

Carlton Lassiter was pissed and for once, a certain psychic was not the cause of his irritation. A cargo ship carrying clothes had crashed offshore and he was stuck with the unfortunate task of monitoring cleanup duty.

Dammit, he was a detective, not head of maintenance. He should be spending the day at the station solving crimes and catching law-breakers. However, because they didn't currently have any big cases, Chief Vick assured him his partner could handle things at the station while he took care of the recovery of the ship and it's cargo.

'_What the hell good is the Coast Guard if I have to be here to baby sit?_' he thought with a mental growl.

Thankfully, the ship itself had already been towed to shore, so now it was merely a matter of recovering any scraps of the ship as well as any fallen crates of clothing. Carlton was currently on one of three medium sized boats and was helping to monitor the status of each scuba diver as they brought the ship's remaining contents up from the ocean floor. Because it had been a fairly large ship, professional civilian divers had been called on to help alongside the police divers. Each diver had radio contact with the three ships and was to check in at frequent intervals.

The whole thing had been going on since seven in the morning and after five hours of that, Carlton was ready for a break.

'_It's about time to be calling the divers up for lunch anyway,_" Carlton thought with a quick glance at his watch.

It was at this moment that one of the divers burst out of the water, pulling off her scuba regulator, and started screaming. Both Carlton and another man named Frank who worked for the Coast Guard rushed to the side of the ship and pulled her on board.

"What is it? What's wrong?" Carlton calmly asked, looking her over for any injuries, but seeing nothing physically wrong.

Looking about ready to go into shock, she said shakily, "There was.. There was a black bag down there." Bursting into tears, she sobbed, "There were body parts in it!"

Before Carlton would even process what she said, further away at one of the other boats, he could hear another diver surface and swear up a storm about the sick world they lived in. Not too long after that, a third diver reached the surface with a scream.

Taking control of the situation, Carlton left Frank to deal with the hysterical woman and radioed for all divers to return to the surface. Once everyone was accounted for, Carlton sent all the civilian divers back to shore on one of the three boat where they were to stay until they each gave their statement.

Pulling out his cellphone, Carlton Lassiter called up Chief Vick and said, "Chief, we have a situation down here..."

* * *

Not so far away, Shawn Spencer watched the live news report with a grin and said with an excited glint in his eye, "Gus, we are _so_ getting in on this case."

* * *

Not much fazes me these days. Why just recently, I killed two people at once and cleaned up my work just in time to go have breakfast; a nice, juicy steak with a tall glass of strawberry milk. Not exactly breakfast food, but I don't usually get the chance to have lunch and dinner. I like to look past the definition of breakfast and treat myself to whatever I crave, but I digress. 

I've been doing this for so long and I'm always so clean and careful that I've just come to expect things to go my way. Nothing out of the ordinary was supposed to happen and nobody was supposed to know. What I did was personal, intimate almost (but not in a sexual way), and wasn't to be shared with anyone but my playmates. It was a relaxing secret little hobby of mine and now the world knew. I never felt so violated before.

I was only a bit shocked by the news report, not at all worried, yet my body betrayed me as my heart raced.

Calm down, oh heart of mine, I've left no clue, no trace of evidence linking my involvement.

I watched the news with mild interest.

Only five bodies found so far? Well, the police have quite a bit of work ahead of them.

With my eyes focused on the screen, I frowned and wondered what this meant for my night time play dates. I'd have to find a new, inconspicuous spot to hide the bodies. I'd also have to be more careful about how I got supplies. If someone figured out my method of killing, my buying habits would eventually link back to me as a suspect.

I'll have to think more about this later. For now, it's time to retreat.

* * *

_That's the end of chapter one. Review please and tell me what you think._


	2. Chapter Two: Cuts

_Hello again! I bring you chapter 2._

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

**Chapter Two: Cuts**

**  
**Sometime in the past...

_It was an accident, that's what I told him, but judging from the look on his face, I don't think he believes me. Really though, it _was _an accident, or at least the first cut was. It surprised me at first, the way it just seemed to appear on my hand. _

_As I watched the blood run down my finger, my shock transformed into a morbid curiosity. An unusual feeling spread through me, but it wasn't exactly a bad feeling. I actually kind of liked it. It made me smile, which was weird because I never smiled. There was just no reason for it, and yet here I was, smiling, with this unknown feeling growing inside of me. _

_I twisted my hand around in the air so that while the blood continued to trail down my hand, it wouldn't collect up enough at a single spot to the point where it would drip off of me and onto the clean counter top. _

_My gaze drifted from the cut to the offending knife lying on the counter next to an apple I must have been cutting up before. It lay there portraying a false image of innocence, but I could see right past its façade; its silver blade flirtingly reflecting the sun's rays from the kitchen window. _

_With my clean hand, I picked up the knife and made another cut, this time on my arm. Then I made another, and then another, and with each cut I made, that feeling inside of me grew until it completely filled me. It seemed to roar in a mix between approval and pleasure at the sight of the red, flowing blood. While this feeling, this Need was satisfied by the blood, at the same time I was satisfied with my ability to keep said blood from dripping onto the clean, white countertop. _

_This was around the time he walked into the kitchen, my dad. Looking from the knife in my hands to the cuts on my arm, it was pretty easy for him to put two and two together. He took the knife away from me and asked me what the hell I was thinking. He looked frightened. _

_So I told him it was an accident. _

_Yes, the first cut was definitely an accident. _

_The second one was more hesitant, almost unsure. _

_The third was a test that I graded with a C-. It was slightly too messy, I didn't like it. _

_The fourth one though, that one was a perfect, clean cut. _

_A+ work._

* * *

The station was abuzz with activity when Shawn and Gus arrived. They had to struggle through a mass of people just to get through the front doors. By now everyone had heard the news report and anyone who knew of someone who had disappeared in the past had flocked to the station to find out if any of the bodies found had been their friends or family. They all stood outside waving pictures and shouting names; blocked off by several officers trying to make order of the crowd. 

"Hey! Who just touched my butt?" Gus squawked at he swung around with a glare. "Shawn, we should come back when things have calmed down a bit."

"No way, Gus. If we're to get on this case, we have to do it while it's fresh," Shawn said with an amused smile before announcing loudly, "Psychic Detective coming through!"

The two slipped past the officers with a friendly nod in greeting before heading into the station which was just as crazy inside as it was outside. Officers were moving about every which-way like a bunch of buzzing bees and Carlton was shouting out orders and directing their movements.

"Lassi!" Shawn shouted. "You do your bee dance so well. Look at that control!"

Carlton's shoulders stiffened at the sound of the psychic's voice and he groaned before turning to face the younger man, "Spencer, I don't have time for this."

"It's not my decision to be here Lassi, the spirits demanded it. Their pull was too strong," Shawn said. "The spirits need me to see the Chief."

"I'm sure they do," Carlton said condescendingly and Shawn frowned. "But in case you haven't noticed, she's a little busy at the moment."

Gesturing over at Chief Vick's office, they could see that she was currently talking on the phone and looking quite flustered.

"Don't worry, it'll only take me a second," Shawn said before prancing away to the Chief's office, Gus calmly following in his wake.

Carlton shook his head with a sigh before turning back to the swarm of officers and shouting, "How's the construction coming in the back? I need it done today people!"

Shawn and Gus entered Chief Vick's office just as she hung up the phone with an annoyed growl. Knowing it would be a little redundant to fake a vision about the bodies from the bay seeing as how news reports had been covering the story all day, Shawn instead went with what he had previously told Carlton.

"Chief, I've been getting a strong feeling all day," he began. "The spirits, they-"

"Save it, Mr. Spencer," she sighed. "This is out of my hands."

Remembering her not-so-pleasant phone call, Shawn said, "The FBI, they're taking over the case."

"Yes," she confirmed. "They're flying a special agent down tonight. There'll be a debriefing tomorrow and he'll be picking his team. I advise you to take you visions to him." she stood up with several files in hand. "Now if you'll excuse me..."

"Of course," Gus said, stepping aside to let her pass.

"You're still number one in my book, Chief!" Shawn called after her, receiving a eye-roll in response. Turning to Gus, he grinned, "You heard the Chief, tomorrow, bright and early, we'll meet Mr. FBI man and get on his good side."

"I'm not too sure the FBI has a good side," Gus muttered as he left the Chief's office.

"They can't _all_ be bad," Shawn said, following him out, but paused outside the door. "You go ahead, Gus. I'm gonna stick around here and see if I can get any _psychic vibes._"

"Okay, but I'm not coming back to pick you up," Gus stated.

"That's fine. Jules or Lassi can give me a ride," he said, waving his friend away.

As Gus left, Shawn turned his attention back on the activity in the station. If he were to get in on the case, he'd have to come up with a vision impressive enough for the FBI agent.

'_Looks like I've got a lot of digging ahead of me today,_' Shawn thought as he clapped his hands together and called out with a smile, "Hey, Jules!"

* * *

It was one in the morning when I received _his_ call. I had picked up the phone, half-asleep and not quite my spunky slasher-self when he said quite clearly, "You've got to stop playing with knives." 

That woke me up immediately, and I sat up in bed, my eyes clear and aware. 'You've got to stop playing with knives.' It was a code phrase he used when he wanted to talk to me. It was basically his way of asking if I was alone and free to talk. He never called to exchange pleasantries anymore though, so I knew even without having seen the news reports that this call was all business.

"_You've_ got to stop taking my knives," I said, letting him know that I was, in fact, free to talk. "Hello_Father._ I haven't heard from you in over a month. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"You know damn well why I'm calling," he hissed. "I have told you time and again to quit this sick habit of yours and now look what happened!"

"I can't help what I am," I said simply with a shrug.

"It's called self-control, kid," he growled, but then sighed. "It's too late now though. They found your little grave site."

"It was anything but little," I said indignantly then frowned. "Did you only call me to berate me for a boat crash I had no control of?"

"I'm calling to tell you that you need to stop," he said sternly; trying to order me around as always.

"...Stop?"

"You've been outed, kid. You can't keep doing... what you're doing. If you quit now, your mystery will most likely remain unsolved, but if you keep up with this _moonlighting,_ it'll only be a matter of time before you're caught and drag your family down with you!" he snapped.

"_My_ family?" I asked, amused. "Are you forgetting that you disowned me?"

"That's beside the point and you know it," he said.

"And you know that I'm very careful with what I do," I reminded him. "I won't get caught."

I hung up the phone before he could get out another word and settled back down in bed. As much as I hated to admit it, he did have a point. Life would be harder for me now that the police were aware of me. Still, I couldn't just stop cold turkey. It would be like telling a carnivorous animal to stop eating meat. Not that I ate my playmates, that would just be disgusting.

No, I couldn't stop the Need inside me that wanted to kill. I did have a bit of a problem though. The harbor where I disposed of my playmates was bound to be under police watch by now and there was really no better place in Santa Barbara where I could put them. It's not like we had an alligator farm around.

As I lay in bed and stared up at the ceiling, I realized that I may just have to change the way I killed. Being a creature of habit, it was a strange thought, but it was strange in a good way. I had been killing the same way for so long that I had unknowingly fallen into a rut. Changing my method would bring about a new excitement into my life.

All my life I have been hiding what I did to protect my family, my hobby, and my own existence. I was like a recluse hiding in a house and peaking out at the world through a crack in the blinds, unwilling to show my true self. Suddenly the SBPD were knocking on the front door, asking if I wanted to come out and play.

I climbed out of bed and turned on the lights. After all, who was I to deny the police department a good game?

* * *

_That's the end of chapter two._

_Review please._


	3. Chapter Three: Strawberries

_Hello everyone! I bring you chapter three of Dark Passenger._

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

**Chapter Three: Strawberries**

**  
**Sometime in the past...

'He's not exactly father of the year, is he?' _I mused as I dug through the grocery bags on the table, searching for the fruit that I... loved? No, that wasn't the right word. I don't 'love.' Appreciate? Maybe. Worship? That's quite possible, they taste really good.  
_

_Strawberries. A God among fruit. Ruler over all vegetables... Missing from all grocery bags. _

_"Dad, where are the strawberries?" _

_He hadn't put them away in the fridge yet, I checked. _

_"Strawberries?" _

_He sounded confused, and for a moment I wondered if he wasn't really a bad father, maybe he was just a stupid one. _

_"They're my favorite fruit." _

_I'm sure I had told him this before. I just don't understand why my dad of all people can't remember this one little fact about me. _

_Still looking confused, he said, "But just the other day you were saying-" _

_"No!" I snapped, interrupting him. "Strawberries. I like strawberries, Dad." _

_It wasn't so much about the strawberries as it was about the fact that he never remembers things about me or that he gets his facts mixed up. Sometimes he even forgets what my name is. I didn't understand, it's as if he doesn't even know me at all. _

* * *

Fifteen people and counting. Carlton had trouble believing it. Fifteen bodies had been recovered from the bay grave site so far, or at least, they thought it was fifteen people. It was a little hard to tell when each body had been chopped into pieces. As soon as the rest of the lab results came back with an ID for each body (at the moment only two had been identified), they'd have a more accurate count. Still, an estimated fifteen body count with more to come was too high in Carlton's book. It meant that this killer had gotten away with at least fifteen murders without anyone being the wiser.

'_It's an insult to me and the rest of the SBPD,_' he thought bitterly as he made his way to the room where the debriefing was taking place.

He had just come back from the morgue that had been built exclusively for the murder victims. It was located in a fenced off area behind the station. Chief Vick felt it would be better to have it close so that those who were assigned to the case would have easy access to the bodies. Carlton agreed with her decision, but still found the situation to be a bit morbid.

"This whole case is going to be morbid," he grumbled to himself.

"Lassi, you made it!" Shawn greeted him with a smile, already seated along with Gus in the front row of chairs that had been all neatly lined up. Patting the empty seat beside him, he said, "Here, sit next to me."

Before he could even open his mouth to protest, Juliet came up behind him and said cheerfully, "Come on, let's go sit down."

With his arm already in her grasp, Carlton followed Juliet with a sigh and took a seat next to the psychic.

'_Fake Psychic,_' he thought automatically, staring straight ahead and refusing to engage in whatever conversation attempts Shawn made.

The room filled up quickly with a varied mix between police officers, detectives, and forensics specialists. It wasn't too much later when the Chief entered the room with the FBI agent at her side. He was a tall balding man in a suit who, in Carlton's opinion, didn't look that intimidating. Of course, looks could be deceiving, so Carlton sat back and waited to see what the man had to say.

"The Santa Barbara Butcher case, as the media is calling it, is quickly becoming the largest murder case in our department's history," Chief Vick said. "To assist us on this case, the FBI has sent over Special Agent Mark Vardez. This will not be a case of two agencies pulling rank over one another, it will be a team up, and by working together, we will catch whoever is behind these killings. Agent Vardez?"

"Thank you Chief Vick," Agent Vardez said. "There have been fifteen confirmed victims so far."

He gestured to the back and someone turned off the lights. Using a small controller, Agent Vardez turned on the room's projector and flipped through a few pictures taken of the victims. Out of the corner of his eye, Carlton saw Gus look away.

As he flipped through the pictures, Agent Vardez said, "There are no visible similarities between victims. They vary is race, gender, and age. As of yet though, none of the victims are children or even fall under their early twenties."

Flipping to a slide that held two pictures of the two identified victims while they were still alive, Agent Vardez said, "Two victims have been identified so far. On the right is Reverend Frederick Lake and on the left is Sarah Connors. There is no known connection between the two victims at this time, but as the rest of the bodies are identified, one should come to light." He turned off the projector and gazed at everyone in the room. "I will be going over your files today and by tomorrow will have our task force put together. I want everyone up to speed on this case and-"

"Excuse me," called a voice from the back of the room, and everyone turned in their seats to see one of the secretaries standing in the doorway with an envelope in hand. "I don't mean to interrupt, but this just came in and I thought you'd want to see it."

She brought the envelope to the front of the room and looked a bit unsurely at Agent Vardez before handing it to Chief Vick. Shawn stood up from his chair, a curious look on his face. Carlton stood up as well and could see from his position in the front row that the envelope had been addressed to the 'Head of the Santa Barbara Butcher case.' Printed under that, by a computer apparently, was the SBPD's usual address and in the corner of the envelope where the return address would be were the words: Tag. You're it.

Chief Vick called up one of the forensics specialists who pulled on a pair of rubber gloves and very carefully opened the envelope. Inside was a single sheet of paper and printed on the paper was what looked to be around two dozen different roman numerals all organized into nice neat rows. At the bottom of the page was one sentence: And then there were none.

Shawn only looked at the page for about a second before his hand shot to his forehead and, taking a stumbling step forward, he yelped with closed eyes, "Oh God, I'm getting something!"

"What is it Shawn?" Gus asked, concerned, as both he and Juliet got up from their chairs.

"Brief flashes," Shawn said vaguely and Carlton rolled his eyes. "Six. Three. Four.. Victims! _No wait!_ Victims of the victims! Gus! I'm getting an island and... A book?"

"Lord of the Flies?" Gus asked.

"No," Shawn said, shaking his head dramatically. He stumbled forward again, this time to the forensics specialist with one arm stretched out and reaching for the paper, but the forensics specialist stepped out of reach. "The title. The title!" He grasped blindly for the paper.

"Wait, you mean that Agatha Christie book," Gus said, eyes lighting up with recognition.

"Yes, that's the one!" Shawn exclaimed as his eyes snapped open and Carlton had to admit from the glazed over look on the fake psychic's eyes that he was getting better at his 'visions.' Nearing the end of his vision, Shawn shouted out, "Guilty! Guilty! Guilty! The judge has spoken."

Slowly stepping backwards, Shawn slumped back down in his chair as if exhausted by his most recent vision.

"And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie," Juliet said thoughtfully as she looked down at Shawn. "So you're saying that the Butcher's victims have committed their own grievous crimes?"

"Yes," Shawn panted. "I believe that's what my vision was telling me."

As much as Carlton hated to admit it, Shawn might have the right idea about the connection between the Butcher's victims. Sarah Connors _did _have a record and while it was only for minor things like indecent exposure, it was still something to look into.

"Shawn Spencer," Agent Vardez said in amusement, bringing everyone back to reality. "Psychic consultant to the SBPD. I've been told some interesting stories about you."

"All good I hope," Shawn said with a grin as he straightened up in his chair. "Agent Vardez, I believe that Gus and I could be a great contribution to your task force."

"Mr. Spencer, you do bring up an interesting theory as to the victim's connection and it _is_ something that will be looked into," Agent Vardez said. "However, I don't think you and your friend are the right people for this task force."

Carlton was a little surprised by that, given Shawn's history with cases. Then again, the last FBI agent that assisted the SBPD didn't care much for Shawn either.

"And just why not?" Shawn asked as he stood up.

"Mr. Spencer has a _great_ track record, Agent Vardez," Chief Vick pointed out.

"I'm aware of that, but I'm also aware of your personality type, Mr. Spencer. You treat life as if it's a game and I need somebody who will be more serious about this case on my task force," Agent Vardez explained simply. "This case is just too big for a police consultant to handle."

'_Now why did he have to go and make that last comment?_' Carlton thought in exasperation. '_Spencer's just going to take it as a personal challenge._'

Seeing Shawn's eyes narrow and his usually relaxed posture stiffen, Gus walked over to his friend and placed a hand on his shoulder to both restrain Shawn and remind him to keep his head. Speaking up for the both of them, Gus said, "Well, we can take a hint. If you require our assistance in the future, you know where to reach us. Come on Shawn."

With his hand still on Shawn's shoulder, Gus led his friend out of the room. Carlton watched them disappear from view before taking his seat along with Juliet. As Agent Vardez continued on with the debriefing, Carlton knew for a fact that this was far from over and that Shawn would be back in the near future. Carlton was also pretty sure that everyone in the room _except_ for Agent Vardez was not only aware of this, but was expecting it.

Staring at the oblivious FBI Agent, Carlton thought with an amused mental chuckle, '_Poor bastard thinks he's won._'

* * *

There's no denying that Shawn has an amazing ability. His photographic memory combined with his detective skills makes him a truly worthy opponent and to be honest, I'm quite pleased that he wasn't accepted into the task force. There's no doubt in my mind that, given the proper resources, he would find out about me.

Still, I know that he won't give up that easily and I really _can't_ have him finding out about me. It would ruin everything.

If I were to somehow turn him off of the case... Hmm. Is that a plan I sense?

Shawn's observation and deduction skills rival even my own, and as I said before, he would make a worthy opponent, _however_ he would make an even better partner. Of course, I wouldn't have him kill anyone, he's too emotional and has too much of a heart for that. Imagine the possibilities though: by day, Shawn would locate the truly evil people and find enough evidence to be absolutely sure that they don't deserve to live, and when night came, I would round our little playmates up and take care of the rest.

It's so perfect, I don't know why I never thought of it before.

I think it's about time I contacted my associate-to-be, and while I'm at it, I should get his little friend, Gus, out of the way. The last thing I need is Mr. Guster preaching to Shawn about what's right, wrong, and dangerous.

Looks like I have a busy night ahead of me.

* * *

_That's the end of chapter 3. Hopefully I've kept your attention this far. The story picks up after this point, so stay tuned. _

_Review Please!_


	4. Chapter Four: Alley Cat

_Hello everyone and thank you for your reviews! Here's chapter four for you all. When I started writing this, I wondered what the true definition of emo is today._

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

**Chapter Four: Alley Cat**

Sometime in the past...

_Despite what some may think, the term 'emo' is not a proper definition to describe me. I **have** __cut myself, but it was purely for experimental purposes. I wanted to see what it was like to slice through live flesh, see if I could do it neatly and with a steady hand. It also seemed to satisfy a Need that roared up inside me, demanding blood. I never cut myself again though. After all, I wasn't self-destructive. _

_But the Need came back and I wanted to experiment some more. _

_There was an old tabby cat that hung around the neighborhood. He was always yowling for scraps and girl cats. Day and night you could hear his cat cries. It's not like he didn't have an owner or anything, he belonged to some bitter old guy down the street, it's just that his owner didn't feed him of get him fixed. _

_Now, I say there **was **__an old tabby cat, past tense, because there's not anymore. He led a poor existence living off garbage can scraps and being dragged around by his libido. Nobody in the neighborhood was doing anything about it, so I did. _

_It didn't pan out as well as I had hoped. It was too messy, the cat kept squirming around, and I received several scratches because of it. Still, I was able to get rid of all the evidence. _

_Or at least that's what I thought. _

_"Where's Mr. Drake's cat?" _

_I tried to appear innocent, like I didn't know what he was talking about, but my dad could see straight through my act. He didn't beat around the bush either. _

_"I found the bones." _

_His face held so many emotions I didn't really understand. Anger, disappointment... fear? _

_I looked down and could feel my face heating up. I never wanted him to find out, but I guess it was inevitable. What I did was a guilty pleasure, and I couldn't help but feel like he had discovered a porno magazine under my bed. _

_"Are you mad at me?" I asked, still staring at the ground. _

_He heaved a sigh, "No, kid, I'm not mad at you. I just need some time to think about this... Why don't you go do your homework?" _

_I walked back to the house without a word._

* * *

It was around eleven in the morning when Shawn walked into Psych with a coffee in hand. Gus was already there and was currently in the middle of what appeared to be an important conversation. Shawn sat down in one of the comfy chairs usually reserved for customers and sipped at his coffee while watching Gus talk animatedly on the phone. 

A few minutes later, Gus got off the phone, and as he turned to face Shawn, said psychic asked curiously, "Important phone call?"

Instead of answering him, Gus raised an eyebrow and asked, "You're drinking coffee instead of a pineapple smoothie?"

"I was feeling tired this morning," Shawn said with a simple shrug. "Guess that whole task force thing bothered me more than I thought."

"Usually I would stop you from drinking coffee, but I'll let you have it just this once," Gus said.

"You're a saint, Gus. So who was that on the phone?"

"That was my other job," Gus said. "Remember that pharmaceutical convention I was telling you about?"

"Yeah, but you said you weren't going," Shawn said before taking another sip of coffee. "Some guy named Steve was going instead of you."

"He _was_, but he never showed up this morning," Gus said. "They tried to contact him, but he's not picking up his phone or answering any pages or anything."

"Has Steve always been this unreliable?" Shawn asked.

Crossing his arms as he thought back, Gus said, "He does tend to take a lot of unexpected trips. Well, anyway, they want me to fill his spot and the plane leaves in a few hours."

"Talk about short notice," Shawn snorted.

"This is a huge career-building opportunity for me, Shawn. They want me to present a series of new drugs to some people in high places," Gus said. "But... I won't go if you're going to pursue the Santa Barbara Butcher case."

"I'm flattered that you're concerned, but I can handle this case on my own if you really want to go to this convention," Shawn said with a smile.

"No, Shawn, you can't," Gus said adamantly. "This case is different from all our others."

"We've dealt with serial killers before," Shawn pointed out.

"Not like this," Gus said, shaking his head. "This case gives me a bad feeling and I don't want you working on it alone."

"What if Lassi and the gang decide they want my psychic expertise?" Shawn asked, holding one hand up to his forehead and making a 'vision' face.

"Then you'd be working alongside the police and that's fine," Gus said. "Just as long as you don't go running off alone to follow a lead."

Shawn groaned, "You sound like my dad."

"I'm serious Shawn!" Gus snapped. "I'm not going anywhere unless I'm sure that you won't take on this case."

Shawn didn't even have to look at Gus to know that he telling the truth, and know that Gus would once again give up a huge job opportunity to help him on a case just to keep Shawn out of trouble.

'_I really don't need to be kept out of trouble. I'm sure I could solve this case easily,_' Shawn thought.

It was true, the case was bigger than any other they've had before. The case itself was also a big job opportunity, but considering the score, Gus had more of a right to go to the convention than Shawn did to work on the case.

"I won't work on this case. You can go to your druggies convention," Shawn said with a sigh.

No, he wouldn't work on the case unless a situation absolutely called for it.

Gus stared him in the eyes for a moment before finally saying, "I don't believe you."

"Gus, I'm hurt that you won't trust me on something like this," Shawn said, holding a hand to his heart. "I swear I won't work on the case."

"Pinky swear?" Gus asked, holding up his hand with his pinky out.

"Seriously, a pinky swear? What are we, five?" Shawn said, giving his friend a look, but bringing up his own hand with his pinky out all the same. "Fine, yes, pinky swear. Now, shouldn't you go pack for your flight?"

"No, you know what? I know you, you're going to find a way to work on this case. I'm not going," Gus said, crossing his arms.

"You're going," Shawn said with a roll of his eyes

"No I'm not."

"You're _going!_"

* * *

"...furthermore, I _could_ stay if I wanted to," Gus said as he drove to the airport with his bags all packed and in the trunk. Shawn sat next to him in the passenger's seat with a poorly concealed smirk on his face. "I'm not leaving because of anything you said. I'm going because this is a big career opportunity and you promised to stay out of the case." 

"I hope you know that I will still be taking on other smaller cases," Shawn said.

"That's fine," Gus consented. "Just so you know, I called your dad to keep an eye on you and make sure you stay out of the butcher case."

Looking over at Gus with a gasp, he hissed, "_Betrayer!_"

"You said you weren't going to be working on the Butcher case, so I don't see anything wrong with giving him a heads up," Gus said innocently.

Shawn slouched down in his seat with a pout and grumbled under his breath, "Ruin all my fun.."

* * *

Carlton made it onto the task force along with Juliet, but he didn't really expect anything less. All of the bodies had been recovered from the bay. There had been twenty-one in all. The lab results on all the bodies came back soon after that and pictures of the people were posted to the wall of a room that had been reserved for the Santa Barbara Butcher case alone. Along with those smiling pictures were several gruesome photographs taken of the bodies and in a twisted sort of way, it was as if they were showing a 'before' and 'after' of the people. Under each person's picture was a long list of information about the person and interestingly enough, almost half of the victims had a criminal record. 

'_Looks like Spencer's prediction might be right,_' Carlton thought as he looked at all the pictures on the wall, reviewing the information.

At the moment, Agent Vardez was assigning several different officers to search out people who knew the victims and question them to see if the victims weren't so innocent after all.

"Lassiter, O'Hara!" Agent Vardez barked. "You two are going to find out about Sarah Connors. Her only record was for indecent exposure and if the Butcher truly believes himself to be some sort of _Dark Defender_ then I highly doubt he'd waste his time on such a minor crime."

"Agent Vardez," said Chief Vick as she walked into the room. "A body has just been found in the backroom of a CVS and from the description, it sounds like it might be the Butcher's work."

"Thank you Chief Vick," Agent Vardez said before turning his attention back to Carlton and the rest of the task force. "Change in plans. Lassiter, O'Hara, you're coming with me to the crime scene. Officer Freedner and Officer Turner, you'll take care of evidence for Sarah Connors. The rest of you have your assignments. Let's move out people!"

Everyone left to take care of their different tasks. Carlton, Juliet, and Agent Vardez headed down to the crime scene along with a few forensics specialists. Driving behind Agent Vardez in his own cruiser with Juliet sitting in the passengers seat, Carlton glanced over at her when he heard an angry grumble.

"What was that?" he asked.

"Nothing, I just don't really like Agent Vardez," she said with a shrug before crossing her arms over her chest. "The Butcher _could_ be a woman, you know."

Not about to go against Juliet's silent fury, Carlton agreed, "Yes, that's very possible, but for conversation's sake, it'd be easier to stick to one gender rather than saying 'he or she' all the time."

"I guess you're right," Juliet sighed. "But I still don't like that guy."

They arrived on the scene to see a couple rather disturbed and slightly hysterical CVS workers giving their statement to the officers that had originally been called in. The store itself was closed down and blocked off to prevent customers from coming in and interfering. Noticing their arrival, one of the officers broke away from the workers and led everyone through the store to a door in the back that had a small 'employees only' sign on it.

"It back here," the officer said before opening the door.

Carlton, Juliet, and Agent Vardez entered first and the forensics specialists trailed behind, waiting to get started on the scene. The room was a storage area for the extra products. In the center of the room, lit up by the florescent lights, a body bag had been carefully placed on several stacks of boxes that formed a makeshift table. Taped to the storage racks surrounding the body bag were several pictures of children varying from ages six to thirteen. Taped next to each picture was what looked to be a used plane ticket and along with that were a couple different documents that would have to be looked over later.

The room gave Carlton chills despite the fact that it was extremely clean and not even a single drop of blood could be seen. He slowly approached the body bag along with Juliet and Agent Vardez. As he got closer, he realized that what he first believed to be a black body bag was in fact clear and the black that he was seeing was actually a deep red.

The three stood around the body bag and Agent Vardez curiously prodded the bag with one finger. The bag shifted like a miniature waterbed and Agent Vardez muttered, "Full of blood. Probably our next victim too."

He waved the forensics specialists over. They put plastic down around the makeshift table before pulling on extra-long rubber gloves and, very carefully, unzipped the body bag. While two of the forensics team held up the bag in a way to prevent any of the blood from pouring out, the other cautiously reached in and grabbed the first solid thing he felt. It was a hand and Carlton could clearly tell that any trace of a finger print had been shredded off.

Carefully placing the dismembered hand back into the bag, he reached into the blood again, this time with both hands, and pulled out the head of the victim.

"Oh my God," Juliet said, holding her hand against her mouth in shock and turning away.

All of the hair had been shaved clean off and the face of the head had been sliced and shredded beyond recognition.

"Whoever did this doesn't want us to identify the body right away," Carlton said and looked over at the plane tickets to see that any identifying information had been blacked out.

The forensics man who Carlton couldn't remember the name of at the moment placed the head back into the bag and reached into the blood for a third time. With a bit more effort than before, he pulled out the torso of the body and carved onto the torso was a large VI. The roman numeral for six. It was a bit hard to tell with all the blood staining the victim's skin, but you could see it if you looked closely enough.

"Looks like the work of our Butcher," Agent Vardez said, looking from the carving on the torso to the pictures taped up around them. "Apparently laying low is not on his list of things to do."

* * *

After making sure that Gus did end up getting on his plane, Shawn headed back to Psych in hopes that a client would come in with a case that would distract him from the Butcher case. Sitting down at his desk in a spinny chair, he turned on his computer and absentmindedly spun in a circle as he waited for it to load. The desktop popped up with all its different icons and folders and oddly enough, a few minutes later one of his media players opened on the screen. 

He quirked an eyebrow at the media player, QuickTime Player to be more specific, and could hear the faint whirring of a CD or DVD in the disk drive. Curious, he clicked the _play_ button and the image of a strawberry appeared on the media player's screen.

"_Hello Shawn._"

He narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the use of a voice changer.

"_I believe you know me as the Santa Barbara Butcher, a name I loathe by the way... I have a proposition for you. I've noticed how good you've gotten with your 'psychic' abilities, and after being rejected from the task force, I figured you'd have extra time on your hands, so I want to hire you._"

"Is this for real?" Shawn mumbled to himself as he listened to the message. He hadn't even started and already he had an advantage in the case. While he couldn't exactly tell whether the voice was male or female or if he even recognized it, having a kind of contact with the Butcher was a huge step forward... In a case he promised he wouldn't get involved with.

"Damn that pinky swear," he quietly growled.

"_Given the circumstances of my discovery, I won't have as much time as I used to for finding the necessary incriminating evidence on my bad guys._"

'_Ha! I was right!_' Shawn thought with a grin.

"_That's where you come in, Shawn. During the day, I want you to search out my suspects and find that evidence I feel is necessary for my play dates. The only difference from what you usually do at Psych will be that you won't apprehend the criminal, I will. Now, before you decide, consider what I'm doing. I'm catching the truly evil criminals just as the police are, only **my** criminals don't have a chance to end up back out on the streets. The justice system is flawed, Shawn, and I fix those flaws. My method is more effective. Don't think of me as the Santa Barbara Butcher, think of me as another client who would like to make use of your skills. If you're interested in my offer, tie a balloon to the front door of Psych. I'll take care of the rest._"

The message ended and Shawn closed the window before popping open the disk drive and taking out the blank CD. Holding it carefully in his hands, he looked at it closely in the light to see if there were any finger prints on it. It was completely clean, and of course it was, the Butcher had been living unnoticed for this long, he wouldn't screw up now by sending out one message.

Shawn placed the CD on the desk and sat there staring at it, not quite sure what his next step should be. He knew there was no way he would just blindly follow the Butcher because of one single message. However, if he _pretended_ to accept the Butcher's offer, maybe he could get close enough to get some sort of evidence on the killer or even meet him or her.

Remembering his promise to Gus, he slouched down in his seat with a sigh. It wasn't as if he had never gone back on his word before, but he knew Gus had a point about the case being bigger than any of their previous cases. After all, none of the killers they've dealt with in the past had nicknames.

"The Santa Barbara Butcher. How uncreative is that?" he muttered with a snort.

He could always turn the CD into the police to help with the case...

Grabbing the CD off the desk, he walked over to the filing cabinet that Gus insisted they get and slipped the disk in among the 'B' files. He might show it to the police later... Maybe.. When they asked for his help.

'_Still, I don't want to just sit back and do nothing, not after getting an opening like this,_' he thought to himself as he paced around from room to room of Psych, and when he was tired of pacing, he sat down in the rolling-spinning chair and rolled around the room.

"_Technically_," he said out loud, "I wouldn't be pursuing the Butcher case, I would actually be working on cases the Butcher gives me."

Before he could think any further on the matter and make an actual decision, his cellphone rang. Seeing from the caller ID that it was Chief Vick, Shawn picked up the phone with a grin and said, "Hello Chief Vick. What can I do for you this fine day?"

"I have a case for you, Mr. Spencer, and before you start, no, it has nothing to do with the Santa Barbara Butcher," she said. "How soon can you and Mr. Guster get down here?"

"Gus actually left on a business trip around an hour ago," Shawn said. "I can head down there right now though."

"Good," she said. "See me in my office when you get here."

"Sure thing Chief," Shawn said cheerfully. "See you in a few."

Hanging up the phone, he put his current Butcher dilemma on hold and headed out the door with his helmet and keys.

* * *

The station was as busy as ever and as Shawn slowly made his way to Chief Vick's office, he got a quick glance into the room that, judging from all the pictures and information on the victims, was reserved for the Butcher case. Something that he couldn't help but notice from his quick glance was that under many of the pictures, written in marker, was the word 'murderer.' 

'_That FBI agent knows I'm right and he **still** probably doesn't want me on the case,_' he thought a bit bitterly as he reached Chief Vick's office.

"Mr. Spencer, come in," Chief Vick said, waving him in.

Casually walking into her office, he asked, "So.. Anything new with the Butcher case?"

"That's not you're priority right now," she said sternly before grabbing a file off her desk and handing it over to him. As he flipped through the file, she explained, "A mother and her daughter were found murdered in their home and we've reached a dead end on the case. A similar situation occurred a almost a month earlier, but as far as we can tell, there's no evidence connecting the two."

"No husband or boyfriend?" Shawn asked.

"Both women were widows and according to friends and family, weren't dating anyone," Chief Vick said.

"I'll need access to their houses," Shawn said. "See if I can get any psychic vibes from it."

"Talk to Susan at the front desk, she'll give you what you need," Chief Vick said.

With a smile on his face, Shawn waved 'good bye' to the Chief and after receiving one more warning from her to stay out of the Butcher case, he left to go check out the first victim's house.

* * *

Shawn parked in the driveway of the second victim's house, having just finished looking over the first victim's house, and pulled his helmet off with a sigh. Because the first victim's death had occurred just a month previously, much of the evidence had been cleaned up which made his job very difficult. Still, he was able to conclude that the first victim had been dating someone at the time due to small clues such as the wrapper of a condom left forgotten under the bed. 

Due to the second victim's death being more recent, the house was still blocked off with police tape. This also meant that evidence would be more plentiful.

Glancing at the nice clean car that once belonged to the deceased woman, Shawn walked up to the front door and got inside without any problems thanks to the keys he got from Susan at the front desk. The house itself could almost be considered clean had it not been for the rather large blood stains decorating the living room carpet and parts of the walls. Shaking his head, Shawn bypassed the blood spatters and went on to scour the house for any possible hint of a clue.

While he didn't find something as obvious as a condom wrapper, he did find something useful in the woman's jewelry box. It was a peculiar-looking broach of what appeared to be a red lily. He had seen the first victim wearing the same exact broach in one of her most recent photographs. Now that he knew they had been seeing the same guy, he just had narrow down who that guy could be.

Moving back into the living room, he gingerly stepped around the blood stains and over to a shoebox filled with old mail that had been place on a small desk next to the couch. About ninety percent of the letters were bills. Phone bill. Cable bill. Gas. Electric. Heat. Car.

Wait. The car. The tires on it were barely worn down. Shawn looked out the window at the car sitting in the driveway. Along with the tires, he also remembered when he walked by it before that the inspection sticker was new.

"The car's new," Shawn said as he set the box of bills back down and made his way out of the house. "The other victim also had a new car. Maybe they went to the same dealership."

Locking up the house behind him, Shawn raced over to the new car and opened the passenger's door. All of the documentation for the car was located in the glove compartment, and after skimming through a few papers, he discovered that the dealership was the same dealership owned by Bill Peterson, the man who once hired him to find his son, Brandon, who had stolen from him and ended up losing the stolen money in poker.

"Hopefully Mr. Peterson can shed some light on this situation," Shawn said as he pulled on his helmet and hopped onto his bike. "Hopefully he's not involved."

* * *

After explaining the situation, Mr. Peterson had been happy to help. It only took a quick search through his computer's database to find that one of his newest employees, Greg Wise, had been the one to sell the two women their cars. According to his personal files, his current address was to a cheap motel room, and Shawn was sure that a quick search of the room would give them all the evidence they needed. 

"Chief Vick," Shawn said dramatically with his cellphone to his ear. "I'm getting some strong vibes here. I need you to come down to Peterson Motors ASAP! Yes, as soon as you can... That's fine, i can wait."

* * *

It had been three days since the discovery of the Butcher's latest victim at the CVS. The man had been identified as Steve Richardson after being reported missing two days ago by his co-workers and all the information left behind by the Butcher had matched up with Steve's occupational information. As for the rest of the victims, it had officially been confirmed yesterday afternoon that every one of them had intentionally murdered another person at some point in their lives and in all cases it had been more than once.

Despite this fact, Carlton still didn't think the Butcher had any right to kill those people.

'_If the Butcher's this good at finding other killers, he should be turning them into the police,_' Carlton thought as he looked through some files and wrote information down in others.

There hadn't been a single trace of evidence to go by at the CVS murder scene, or at least, there wasn't any evidence against the Butcher. There was _plenty_ of evidence against Steve Richardson. A few quick phone calls confirmed that Mr. Richardson took each trip that was shown on the plane tickets. After some deep digging and even more phone calls to the proper authorities of each country Steve visited, it was discovered, though not yet officially confirmed, that Steve may have been a involved with a sort of black market organization that allows adults to have sex with children.

Carlton mentally cringed at the information listed on Mr. Richardson's file and wrote down the last few facts before closing the file and moving on to the next. If they were to have some hope of catching or even finding out who the Santa Barbara Butcher was, everyone on the task force had to be completely aware of every little fact including the all the past grievous acts the Butcher's victims committed. So Carlton was stuck at his desk, as were the rest of the task force, reading over every little fact in the victim's files and on the case itself.

Though Carlton would never admit it, the case was starting to get to him. After many years on the force, it was easy for him to deal with the gruesome details behind a homicide investigation, but that was when it was just one or two murders happening gradually in intervals; almost as if he was given a break to deal. This time though, he had to process the gruesome details of _twenty-two_ murderers including the Santa Barbara Butcher himself.. Or herself, you never know.

It was more than one should be able to handle, at least all at once.

'_I should check on O'Hara later and see how she's faring,_' Carlton thought as he looked through Sarah Connors' file.

Sarah Connors: A substitute teacher who seduced then murdered several students throughout her career.

Carlton closed the file with a mental sigh. He needed a break.

"Lassi! I brought you some coffee," Shawn said, suddenly standing before him presenting the cup of coffee in one hand. "It's full of cream and sugar, just how you like it."

Carlton eyed the coffee warily before asking suspiciously, "Why?"

"No reason," Shawn said with a shrug as he set the coffee down on Carlton's desk. "You just looked like you could really use it. Plus, I heard from Jules that working on the Butcher case really sucks right now."

'_The case, or course,_' Carlton thought then said irritably, "I'm not telling you anything about the Butcher case."

Raising his hands defensively, Shawn said, "Woah, relax Lassi, I'm not here to bug you about that." Crossing his arms over his chest with a slightly superior look, he said, "For your information, I just got done with my own psycho murderer case."

"Yes, I remember hearing a bit about that," Carlton said before taking a long, soothing drink of his coffee and inwardly relaxed. It was _exactly_ how he liked it. "The car dealership guy. How's that going?"

"It been pretty cut-and-dry. Got a warrant for his motel room and found all the evidence we needed," Shawn said. "Locks of hair, photos of the two women as well as other possible past victims. I tell ya Lassi, people are _messed up._"

"I can agree with you on that," Carlton said with a frown, then noticed Shawn was frowning too, looking off at something down the hall. "What is it?"

Not answering him, Shawn walked around Carlton's desk and marched off in the direction he had been staring. Turning around in his chair, Carlton saw the man from the car dealership who had been brought in a few days ago walking down the hall without handcuffs on. Walking to his right was a man in a suit and to his left was Buzz McNab. Carlton stood up from his chair and watched the four curiously.

Intercepting them on their way to the front entrance, Shawn asked, "Buzz, what's going on?"

"All charges on my client have been dropped," the man in the suit said.

'_A lawyer,_' Carlton guessed, not liking where the situation was heading.

"What?" Shawn asked incredulously. "No, that can't be possible. We have enough evidence against you!"

"It was.. a filing error, Shawn," Buzz hesitantly explained. "We have to let him go."

"You're kidding me. He kills two women _that we know of_, plus their children, and he goes free because of a _filing error?_" Shawn snapped.

"Mr. Spencer," Chief Vick said sternly as she walked in on the scene. "Let the man pass. There's nothing we can do about this now."

Giving both Greg and the lawyer a death glare, Shawn stepped out of their path and let Buzz walk them out. As soon as they were out of sight, Shawn spun on Chief Vick and hissed, "_A filing error?_"

"I'm as unhappy about this as you are, Mr. Spencer," Chief Vick said. "But there was a significant error in his paperwork and we had no choice but to let him go."

Walking over to the fuming psychic, Carlton said, "These thing's happen sometimes, Spencer. It's why we do things exactly by the book. Don't beat yourself up over it. We just have to keep a close eye on him and wait for him to mess up."

"Mess up and what? Kill another person?" Shawn growled. "Is that what we have to wait for? Do you realize how screw up that is? How... flawed.."

Shawn's shoulders slumped and he suddenly looked defeated. Neither Chief Vick nor Carlton said anything, just waited for Shawn to react.

"I'll see you guys later," Shawn said dully before turning to leave. "Call me if you need me."

Then he left, and Carlton couldn't help but wonder if he was going to be okay.

* * *

Shawn sat in his spinny, rolling chair at Psych with the lights off. Absentmindedly twisting from left to right, he stared through the dark room at the filing cabinet that held the ominous CD. 

'_What was with the strawberry anyway?_' he vaguely wondered as a red balloon floated overhead..

Shawn wasn't an ignorant person. He _knew_ that the justice system was flawed, but he had never experienced such a failure so personally before. The whole thing had made him feel so angry, as if he had been personally wronged, but by the time he bought the balloon and brought it over to Psych, his anger had subsided significantly and he began to question his decision.

He could lie to himself all he wanted and say that he was only doing this so that he could get close enough to the Butcher to catch him, but the fact of the matter was that for a moment, he not only saw that the Butcher had a point, he also agreed with the killer's ideals. You can't just forget an understanding such as that.

While his anger may have faded, if he were given a choice right now to serve Greg Wise to the Butcher on a silver platter, he would most likely do it. If Greg wise were to be.. eliminated, then it would prevent any possible chance of Greg killing another single mother in the future.

Still, the thought scared him. He wasn't that type of person. He wasn't supposed to think like that. His dad taught him better than that; had practically drilled the proper ideals of society into his head as he was growing up. Not to say that he was humanitarian of the year, but he wasn't a killer either.

Then why was he even considering this?

Of course, it's really not much different than taking on a case that leads to the criminal ending up with the death penalty. Then again, the death penalty is more humane when you consider the condition of the bodies, but that was just one small factor in the overall decision. The person would be dead either way whether it be by execution or... _Butcher style._

He didn't know what to do, and there was nobody he could possibly call to help him make this decision.

'_It's not like they're innocent people or even just minor crimes,_' Shawn thought, remembering the glimpse he got of the victim's files. Everyone of them did some pretty horrible things, and if they hadn't been stopped, then they would probably still be doing those things. There would end up being even more victims than just the Butcher's.

"I would just be tying a balloon to the door," he mumbled. "That's all... And then just.. taking on more cases and.. reporting them to someone other than the police. I've done that before with private clients.. this is just another client."

So why did he feel like he was committing a great evil when he grabbed the string of the balloon? Why did he feel like he was heading straight to the apocalypse when all he was doing was walking to the front door?

Yet despite this foreboding feeling growing in the pit of his stomach, he tied the red balloon to the door knob.

He watched it float there lazily, occasionally bouncing against the door in the wind. The apocalypse never came and the world continued to spin.

* * *

I knew he'd come around.

* * *

_YEEESS!!! Done with this chapter **finally!** I'm so unbelievably happy that I actually teared up for a second there. Pathetic, I know. U.U _

_Anyway, this chapter was so much longer because I have certain key events planned out in each chapter and Shawn's decision was essential for this one. Hopefully it wasn't too rushed. (Holy crap, ff wouldn't load this chapter for a second and I almost had a heart attack) _

_Review please!_


	5. Chapter Five: Different

_Hello again! Here's chapter five of this story. After the last chapter, I felt it best to bump the rating up to 'M' mostly due to violence and other similar dark themes that will occur throughout this story._

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

**Chapter Five: Different**

Sometime in the past...

_I slowly wandered through the house, taking in every detail of the pictures hung up on the walls. Dad must have hung them up. I mean, who else would? Still, it was strange because for some reason, Dad never liked putting pictures up. In fact, if I ever put a picture up myself, I would find later on that Dad had taken it down. _

_To make matters stranger, pretty much all the pictures were of me. Not in a creepy way though. Just normal pictures of me; some candid, some posed with a fake smile, many of which were of me doing different activities. What confused me though was that while I had a vague recollection of what happened in each picture, I didn't remember everything. _

_"You're different, kid," came my dad's voice from behind me. _

_I glanced over my shoulder at him before turning my attention back to the photographs. Different... Yes, I had always kind of figured, I just didn't know it was to this extent. _

_"You were born from a dark event. You're not always the same because of it, and you don't always know it." _

_I know it now though. _

_"This urge you feel, it won't go away. In fact, it'll only get stronger." _

_The Need. The want for blood, perfectly controlled, and clean cuts. The urge to extinguish a life, to see the light fade from another's eyes. _

_"Eventually you'll want to move on from smaller game to something... bigger." _

_People. _

_"Not if you don't want me to," I said, spinning around to face him. _

_Yes, I have thought about it before, even had daydreams about it, but I wouldn't do it, not if Dad didn't want me to. While I didn't 'love' anything myself, I knew that Dad really cared about me; he was the only one who did. Even I must admit that that means something. Although I'd never say it out loud, I didn't want to disappoint him. _

_"You're a good person, kid. I know this because of the fact that you care about what I think, but this is too big for us to stop." _

_"Are you going to send me away?" I asked, feeling resigned to my fate. I wouldn't hate him if he did, it's what anyone would do. _

_"No," he said, shaking his head, and I was surprised. "This may be too big for us to stop, but it's something you can control." _

_"I don't understand," I said, confused. _

_He sighed, then said, "There are some people in this world who deserve to die; bad people who can't always be stopped by the law." _

_"I could stop them," I murmured, finishing his train of thought. I was surprised by what he was saying. Imagine the possibilities.. _

_"I'm going to teach you how to do the job right," he said. "How do to it cleanly." _

_"I'm clean!" I protested, offended. I was very clean._

_"Even cleaner than your usual cleanliness," he explained. "Nobody can find out about this, kid. Our family depends upon this staying a secret. Do you understand?" _

_My gaze was drawn back to the photographs and I nodded, "No one will know, for our family's sake." _

_"Good. Now help me take these pictures down."_

* * *

Shawn woke up that morning with a feeling of dread. He had given in to the Butcher's offer and he had no idea what to expect next. The killer hadn't exactly been very informative as to what would happen after he tied up the balloon. As he dragged himself out of bed that morning, he repeatedly told himself that it was just another client he was working for and that all he was doing was gathering information. There was no harm in that. It was completely innocent. 

Shuffling out of the bedroom like a zombie, he headed straight to the bathroom and took a quick shower. After pulling on some relatively clean clothes, he headed into the kitchen to force some breakfast down his throat. He really wasn't even that hungry, but he remembered the different lectures on how breakfast was the most important meal of the day and decided that even a few slices of pineapple would be better than nothing.

However, before he could even think about opening the fridge, his attention was drawn to the two photographs held up by magnets and he forgot about breakfast altogether. The two pictures stuck to the fridge hadn't been there last night, which meant that while he slept, someone had broken into his apartment and stuck them there, and he knew just who that someone was.

"The Butcher knows where I live," he muttered, alarmed.

He knew it wasn't inconceivable. The Butcher could have easily looked him up in the phone book. Still, it was a scary thought that a mass murderer not only knew where he lived, but had actually been walking around his house while he slept.

"No more sleeping for me," he said. "Not for a while."

Knowing that the next step to be taken in the Butcher's plan relied on him, Shawn decided to get a closer look at the pictures and commit the people's faces to memory. Written at the bottom of each picture was the person's name.

The first picture was of a middle aged woman with graying brunette hair. She had a cheerful smile on her face and looked quite innocent, but obviously she was anything but that if she was under the Butcher's suspicion. Her name was Wanda Cladstine.

The second picture was of a man who looked to be in his thirties with long dark hair tied back in a ponytail. He didn't look as friendly as Wanda, but still didn't look like a murderer either. Then again, who _looks_ like a murderer? Unless the person's a moron, they would look like just another citizen. The man's name was Dave Coveld and taped to his picture was a business card for a bar.

'_Two suspects and an unknown amount of time,_' he thought to himself as he looked between the pictures. '_I think I'll check out Wanda first._'

Pulling the business card off of the photo, he slipped it into his pocket before gathering the rest of his things to go. As he headed out the door with his helmet and keys, he grabbed the two photos off the fridge and made sure to drop them in the building's incinerator on his way out. It would be stupid to hold on to them if the two people were to be the Butcher's future victims.

* * *

Carlton was a bit concerned for someone who had somehow made it onto his list of colleagues despite not actually being a legitimate member of the SBPD. Three days ago, Shawn had left the station with a look of defeat and no one had heard from him since then. Usually Carlton wouldn't care when Shawn threw a tantrum over not getting his way, but this time it was different. This time he could actually sympathize with the psychic. 

In the past, Carlton had had his own share of cases where the bad guy got away due to a stupid mistake, so he understood the feeling of failure that Shawn was undoubtedly experiencing. The difference between them was that Carlton was used to these things happening and could let it roll off his back. Shawn, on the other hand, had never dealt with something like this before and it was obviously hitting him hard.

He knew that somebody should check up on the younger man, especially since Gus was out of town. Usually he would dump such a task onto Juliet's shoulders, but at the moment she was a bit too preoccupied. Apparently her hatred for Agent Vardez had been picked up by the FBI agent himself and for some reason the man found her fiery attitude against him attractive. Apparently he saw it as some sort of challenge and consequently, Juliet became his right-hand_wo_man and was dragged along to every major lead.

'_That guy's nuts,_' Carlton thought with a shake of his head. '_If anything, she wants to kill him more._'

She was a short fuse and he was a lit match. It wasn't a good combination.

So Carlton decided that he would check up on Shawn when he got the chance, but it was only because he wanted to make sure the younger man didn't do anything stupid. He couldn't leave now though because they had a lead on the case. Well, actually they had two leads, but one of the leads wasn't his responsibility to follow.

The first lead came from a neighbor who witnessed one of the victims being dragged into a car. At the time, the neighbor didn't think much of it because the victim in question was commonly drunk, so to the neighbor, it looked like the victim was being helped into his car. Since it was the last time the man was seen though, they suspected otherwise.

What was so helpful about this bit of information was that due to the neighbor's paranoia, he wrote down notes of every little bit of information that happens outside his house. Among these notes was a license plate number. The only problem was that the paranoid man had poor organizational skills and so Carlton was stuck looking through all the notes of the year the victim had gone missing.

' '_April third_' ' Carlton mentally read off with a yawn. '_'Ms. Wilkins parks crooked in driveway. Possibly drunk.' Dear lord, strike me down now._'

The second lead came from the rocks that had been used to sink the body bags into the ocean. Apparently the algae on the rocks could be traced to a specific area the Butcher got them which would most likely be the same place where the Butcher keeps a boat, but finding that information was up to the lab techs.

Sighing, Carlton flipped to the next page in the tiny note book, '_'April fourth.._' '

* * *

It took two days worth of digging and sneaking around for Shawn to find all the evidence he needed on Wanda. Apparently the woman hated children with a fiery passion and with the help of several different aliases as well as disguises, she would snatched toddlers right out from under the parent's noses and bring them to one of the many hidden locations she had to kill them. 

After seeing the pictures the woman kept of her victims, Shawn really couldn't find even a hint of remorse for what he was doing or who he was working for. The woman deserved whatever she would get, and he was sure that Mr. Coveld would too.

However, before he had a chance to do any research on Dave Coveld, someone started following him. It didn't take him long to realize this, so he wasn't really worried that they had been following him long enough to know that he had been investigating Wanda. He didn't know a thing about who was stalking him except for the fact that they drove a red BMW that looked a little worn out.

To avoid suspicion, he wouldn't be able to investigate Dave the same way he did Wanda. He'd have to be more careful and more subtle. At the moment, the only thing he could really do was check out the bar listed on the business card. It was probably his best bet toward finding Dave. After that point, he'd just wing it.

* * *

It took several long hours, but Carlton finally found the license plate number. Everything else went by quickly after that. He entered it into the system and a car matching both the plate numbers and the neighbor's description of it had been sitting in an impound lot for around the same time the victim had gone missing. After getting all the paper work straightened out, Carlton sent a team over to strip down the car and gather evidence. 

_'All that there is left to do is wait for the evidence to be processed_,' Carlton thought. '_Man, do I need a drink._.'

Grabbing his things, he clocked out for the night and headed to one of the nearby bars.

* * *

Whoever had been tailing Shawn decided that they didn't want to come into the bar and risk having him see them, so as far as he could tell, he didn't have to worry about being spied on. The man from the picture wasn't currently in the bar, so Shawn took a seat at a table in a corner that allowed him to see everyone around him. He only ordered a water and sat there, not really drinking it, while waiting to see if Dave Coveld would come. 

While he waited, he thought back to the car following him and wondered who it might be. He doubted it was the Butcher because even though Shawn was technically on the Butcher's side at the moment, it would just be plain stupid for the killer to leave his or herself so open to be discovered, and the Butcher was anything but stupid.

Aside from the Butcher though, he couldn't think of anyone else that would be following him. It wasn't as if he had given anyone reason to be suspicious of him. At least, he didn't think he did.

His cellphone started ringing and his heart jumped into his throat until he saw that it was his dad calling.

"Hi, Dad."

"Hey, Shawn. What are you up to tonight?" Henry asked.

Looking around the bar once again for Dave, Shawn said, "Not much, just working on a small case."

"It's not the Butcher case, is it?" Henry asked with a stern tone.

"No, Dad," Shawn sighed. "It's ..a different case. Why? What are you up to tonight?"

"Just some night fishing, that's all," Henry said. "Figured I'd call and see if you wanted to come."

"..Dad, I hate fishing. You know this," Shawn said. "Why would you even ask?"

"Well, excuse me for wanting to have a little father/son bonding time," he snapped.

"Wait, are you just trying to keep an eye on me?" Shawn asked irritably. "Dad, I'm _not_ working on the Butcher case, okay? Stop worrying."

"It's a mass murderer, Shawn. I think I'm aloud to be a little worried," Henry said.

He was about to snap something back, as was usual in their arguments, but stopped when he noticed Dave walk through the doors and head straight into the back rooms.

"I gotta go, Dad. Just got a lead on the case, a _different_ case. Enjoy your fishing, bye!" he said all in one breath and clicked his phone shut before Henry could get out a word of protest.

Abandoning his water, Shawn moved up to the bar itself and sat down on one of the stools. Dave returned a moment later wearing an apron with the bar's logo on it and began mixing drinks for people. Ordering only a soda, Shawn watched the bartender out of the corner of his eye. The man seemed friendly enough and had good people skills, but of course looks were deceiving.

"Can I get you anything else?" a second bartender asked.

Seeing that he drank all his soda, Shawn threw the second bartender a charming smile and said, "Let's go with a rum and coke this time."

Nodding, the man went to got get his drink and Shawn turned his attention back on Dave who was currently flirting with a girl while he mixed her drink.

'_I wonder what he did,_' Shawn thought.

"Rum and coke," the second bartender said, setting the drink down before him and Shawn smiled in thanks.

Taking a sip of his drink, Shawn turned his attention from Dave to the second bartender and asked conversationally, "So what's the story on this place? I've never heard of it before."

"Not really much of a story," he said shrugging. "Opened up the place a few years ago and have been serving food and drinks since then."

"Oh, so you're the owner?" Shawn asked, taking another drink.

"Co-owner, yes," he said, nodding.

Another person sat down and the second bartender, or rather the co-owner, went to go fix them a drink. Taking another sip of his own drink, Shawn glanced back over to Dave and saw that he was no longer flirting with the girl. Instead, he was bringing a few plates of food over to one of the tables.

While he watched Dave move from table to table, he saw the front door open and glanced over to see Carlton, of all people, walk though the door. The detective was still dressed in his work clothes and didn't seem to notice Shawn as he took a seat at one of the tables.

'_Better finish this up quick,_' Shawn thought as he downed the rest of his drink and pulled some cash out of his pocket to pay for it. When the co-owner came over to collect the cash, Shawn asked, "So, are you hiring? I'm pretty good at fixing drinks and you seem to be a little short handed." He gestured over at Dave, the only other person working.

"Nope, sorry," the man said. "Dave and I have been running this joint since it's opened and we've done fine without any outside help so far."

"Oh, you two run it together," Shawn said thoughtfully and he could feel stomach twist.

"You sure ask a lot of questions," the man said, a smile on his face.

"Yeah," Shawn said with a frown. Suddenly something didn't feel right about the whole situation. Feeling his heart pounding in his chest, he said, "Well, I should go."

"Why don't you stay for another drink?" he said, still with that smile on his face.

"No money," Shawn said and shook his head which turned out to be a bad idea when the walls began shaking too.

"It's on the house," the man insisted.

Instead of answering, Shawn slid off of the bar stool. His legs felt numb and seemed to strain against his own weight as he stood.

"You don't look so good," the second bartender said, a concerned look on his face. "We got a room in the back, why don't you go lay down."

For a moment, Shawn thought about how nice that would be to go lay down because he obviously wasn't feeling good. Just for a minute until he recovered. The bartender was so considerate and that was such a nice offer.

Suddenly a sliver of logic tore through the haze that was quickly consuming his mind and he spun around to where he last remembered Carlton sitting. The room spun with him and he had to reach a hand out to one of the bar stools to keep from falling over.

"Lassi!" he shouted across the room and saw the detective look up. Waving a bit too enthusiastically, he called again, "Lassi! Fancy meeting you here."

To both bartenders' dismay, he walked over to Carlton's table, though it was really more of a stumbling attempt. With his sense of perspective close to zero percent, he practically slammed into the side of Carlton's table causing the detective's own drink to tip over and spill everywhere.

Jumping up to avoid getting the drink on him, he snapped, "Spencer, what the hell?"

Leaning heavily against the table, Shawn stared up at Carlton with a pleading look and asked, "Could you give me a ride home, Lassi? I can't drive like this."

"Call someone else," he said irritably.

"No one elsh," Shawn said his speech starting to slur. "Plleez."

"Fine," Carlton growled with a roll of his eyes. "Let's go."

Walking around the table, Carlton grabbed hold of his arm and dragged him stumbling out of the building. His car wasn't far, something that Shawn was extremely grateful for. Opening the car door, Carlton helped Shawn slump down into the passenger's seat and after several fumbling failed attempts to buckle himself in, Carlton grabbed the seatbelt from his hands and did it for him.

Shawn leaned his head against the window of the car door as Carlton pulled away from the curb and headed toward his apartment complex. As they drove through the night, Shawn wondered how Carlton knew where his apartment was. The question left his mind quickly though and instead he thought about how nice it would be to just lay down in his bed and go to sleep.

'_That's all I really need. Sleep,_' he thought as the haze on his mind grew thicker.

"Damnit Spencer, now much did you drink?" he heard Carlton's voice drift over to him.

"I.. only one glass," he insisted as he dragged his head around to look at the detective who, for some reason, didn't seem to believe him.

Then suddenly the world around him exploded into colorful lights that swirled and danced; flowing through the air like water or visible wind.

"Carly," Shawn said slowly and reached one hand up to run his fingers through the lights. "I think... I need togota the hosital.."

* * *

_Damnit. It was only his second suspect and already he's gotten himself into trouble. If Detective Lassiter hadn't been there, I would have had to intervene. He's going to have to be more careful than that if he's to keep helping me in the future. It's true that it is partially my fault for not realizing that both bartenders were in on it, but Shawn's supposed to be smart enough to safely figure that out on his own so that I don't have to. It's what I hired him for. __Perhaps I overestimated him. Maybe he's not the right person for the job. _

_No.. A boss wouldn't fire a new employee after only one mistake. I should give him another chance._

_But do I__ really want to risk putting him into that sort of danger? In a perfect world, we could work together without any problems. The world is anything but perfect though. _

_I can't help but wonder if things would've been better off had I not tampered with Greg Wise's files... _

* * *

_I'm stopping chapter five here. I pulled a muscle in my hand typing this chapter. How is that even possible? The bartender drugged Shawn's drink, if you didn't quite get that. Oh, and YAY for those of you who guessed the Butcher's previous involvement with Shawn's case. More to come. _

_Review please!_


	6. Chapter Six: Hunting

_Hello everyone! Here's chapter six for you all. Don't know if I said this before, but this story takes place during the first season and is therefore a bit AU. Then again, pretty much all fics are AU._

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

**Chapter Six: Hunting**

Sometime in the past...

_I wasn't too big on emotions, especially positive ones; negative ones were more common for me if I had any emotions at all. Today, however, excitement welled up inside me, threatening to explode. Dad was taking me on my first hunting trip. I had never killed anything quite as big as a deer before and I wondered how well I would do with so much to work with. _

_The bushes rustled in the distance and a buck emerged with an impressive pair of antlers. Dad lifted his gun and brought the animal down with one shot. I raced over and Dad calmly walked in my wake. When we reached the animal, I realized that it was still panting heavily on the ground. _

_"It's still alive," I said, looking over my shoulder at Dad. _

_"This is how we'll deal with your urge for now," he said as he pulled out a dangerous looking hunting knife and held it out to me. "Keep in mind that any future victims you have will still be alive too." _

_I didn't understand. I've done this before, I've killed something that was still alive. A deer may be bigger, but I didn't see how it was any different. _

_"When it's a person, it will be different," he said, as if reading my mind. _

_I took the knife from his hand and turned back to the deer. It was big, bigger than anything I've ever dealt with before. I plunged the knife into the deer's side and began cutting carefully. A grin spread across my face as I watched the blood run. _

_"Stop smiling. This isn't supposed to be fun," Dad said. _

_The grin dropped from my face, but I didn't stop cutting. It wasn't supposed to be fun, but like many forbidden things, it was. I just wouldn't let Dad know that. _

* * *

When Shawn drunkenly slammed into his table, Carlton knew that any attempts at having a heart-to-heart talk with the younger man would be a futile effort. Shawn probably wouldn't remember a single thing he said by tomorrow morning, so Carlton grudgingly decided to drive the drunken psychic home and avoid any motorcycle accidents that were bound to happen otherwise. Truthfully, he was a little disappointed that Shawn had resorted to drinking away his troubles. 

Then, not even halfway to the psychic's house, Shawn threw him for a loop.

'_Hosital?_' Carlton wondered, then realized, "The hospital." Throwing a quick glance at Shawn who was currently waving a hand in the air, he asked, "Why, what's wrong?"

"Somemun slip me some'in," he slurred and his hand fell limply to his side. "Drugz."

Swearing under his breath, Carlton turned on his car's sirens, pulled a quick U-turn and sped off toward the hospital. As he drove, he consistently looked over at the younger man to keep track of his condition.

"Nothing is ever easy with you, is it Spencer?"

Shawn gave no verbal response, just writhed in his seat and moaned as he pulled against his seat belt. As an afterthought, Carlton locked the doors just in case and only unlocked them when they reached the hospital. With Shawn's arm slung over his shoulders, he had to practically drag the younger man, who couldn't seem to gain control of his legs, through the emergency entrance. Plopping him down in one of the waiting room chairs with a quick order to stay put, Carlton went over to the front desk to get a doctor as quickly as he could.

"His drink was spiked with something," Carlton explained to one of the women at the front desk. "I'm not sure with what, but it's hitting him really hard."

"Bring him over there and I'll check his vitals," the nurse said, gesturing to a small examination room right next to the front desk.

"Okay, I'll go.." he trailed off at the sight of the empty seat where Shawn should have been. He only had his back turned for a second and already the psychic snuck off. Of course, he should've expected something like this. His eyes darted around the waiting room because he couldn't have gotten far.

There! In the corner, crouched down.

With a half relieved sigh, he walked over to Shawn who was currently rubbing a tissue against the wall. A box of tissues sat next to him and several other tissue were scattered around him.

Carlton kneeled down near Shawn and, reaching a hand out and resting it on the psychic's shoulder, he calmly called out, "Spencer?"

"Don't touch me," Shawn hissed, deadly serious, and briefly glared over his shoulder at the detective before turning his attention back to the wall.

Carlton withdrew his hand and spoke in a soothing tone, as if trying to calm a feral beast, "Alright Spencer. No touching. I just need you to see the doctor and everything will be okay."

"Don' patronize me," Shawn said. "I' notta shild. I know wha's goin-non."

"If you know what's going on, then you know you need to see a doctor right now," Carlton said, trying to reason with him.

Shawn paused for a moment, as if contemplating what Carlton was saying, then continued to wipe at the wall as he muttered to himself, "I missa spot.."

"Spencer-"

"No! Yur sayin it wron," he growled.

"Fine, 'Shawn' then. Now come on," Carlton said, getting a little frustrated with the situation.

When Shawn said nothing and decided to ignore Carlton in favor of tending to the wall, Carlton grabbed Shawn by one arm to pull him to his feet. Immediately in response to this, Shawn took a swing at the detective, but Carlton had been expecting a reaction like this and was able to grab him by the wrist and stop him in his tracks.

With both of Shawn's arms in his grasp, Carlton dragged him toward the examination room. He struggled at first while hissing obscenities, but after a couple of steps, his eyes went glassy and he followed Carlton like a drunken puppy. He sat Shawn down in one of the chairs in the examination room and the nurse came in a moment later.

"Thought I might have to call for backup," she commented as she checked Shawn's blood pressure. Handing a clipboard full of forms over to Carlton, she said, "Here, fill these out."

As the nurse listened to Shawn's heart and checked his eyes and reflexes, Carlton flipped through the paperwork and filled out as much as he could.

'_I'll have to contact Henry,_' Carlton thought as he glanced at the blank spots on the forms he couldn't fill out.

"I don't know a lot of answers to these questions," he told the nurse. "Wouldn't they be on his records?"

"We'll have to look it up," she said as she unwrapped a sterile needle. Grabbing Shawn's hand, she asked, "You said his name is Shawn?" Carlton nodded. "Shawn, can you feel this at all?"

She pricked his finger with the needle for some sort of reaction, but Shawn just lay slouched down in his seat, staring wide-eyed at something only he could see. The nurse frowned before writing something down on a chart.

"So?" Carlton asked.

"He'll survive, but it's going to be a rough night for him," she explained as she put a band-aid over Shawn's finger. "We'll need to run a couple tests and the doctor will probably want to keep him for overnight observation. You can stay if you want. Otherwise, we'll call you if anything comes up."

For a moment, Carlton stared down at Shawn who looked as high as a kite and completely vulnerable sitting in the chair. His eyes would drag one way slowly before jerking back the other way. It wasn't that Carlton felt pity for the man, if anything, Shawn somehow got _himself_ into this mess, but the sight of the psychic _wasn't right._ It was abnormal. Shawn was supposed to always be bouncing off the walls and living to annoy him, not sitting lax in a chair looking half-dead.

"I'll stay," he said, and the nurse walked off to grab a wheelchair.

As Carlton helped the nurse move the immobile psychic into the wheelchair, he assured himself that he was only naturally concerned for a coworker and not at all worried out of his mind. Why should he be worried? The nurse said he'd be fine, and as soon as he gets Henry down here, he would be free to go and get a good night's sleep.

Shawn was soon set up in a bed and dressed in a hospital gown. He was in his own little curtained-off room with Carlton seating in a chair next to the bed. The psychic lay limply on the bed, having just about lost all control of his motor functions, and stared up at the ceiling with his eyes still involuntarily darting back and forth.

The doctor came in soon after and took a blood and urine sample (during which, Carlton politely stood outside). With that done, the doctor hooked Shawn up to a couple IVs before leaving to have some tests run on the samples, assuring Carlton that the younger man would be just fine.

Carlton almost believed them until Shawn's eyes went wide and he started screaming and thrashing as best as someone can with little motor control. Surprised, Carlton stood up and stepped back from the bed. Shawn was only able to rip out one IV before nurses flooded the room and held him down.

This only freaked him out more though and his screams turned to shouts of, "No! No! Get them off me!" He screamed some more, and struggled, and snarled, "Get _off!_"

The nurses read his chart and didn't know quite what to do. They didn't yet know what he'd been drugged with and didn't want to give him a sedative for fear of it having a bad reaction with whatever else was poisoning his body.

Finally, Carlton couldn't take their incompetence anymore and pushed one of the nurses away from the bed while shouting at the rest, "Get off him! You're just making him worse." Surprisingly, they backed off, and Carlton turned his attention onto Shawn, saying in a soothing voice, "It's okay. It's me, Lassiter. Lassi, remember? _Calm down._ You're fine."

The psychic's eyes flickered with something, Carlton didn't quite know what, and the screaming morphed into a twisted, hysterical sort of laughter. Carlton rested a hand over Shawn's and the laughter died down. As the nurses reattached the IV, they contemplated restraining Shawn, but at Carlton's glare, they scurried out of the room with the excuse that they were getting the doctor.

As soon as they were alone, Shawn looked over at Carlton and murmured, "I owe you one, Detective."

When the doctor entered the room, Shawn turned his slightly twitching eyes to the ceiling, ignoring everything around him. The doctor apologized profusely for what had happened and assured the two men that it was just hospital procedure and the nurses were trying to help. As for the test results..

"Ketamine?"

The doctor nodded and said, "Yes, along with small traces of other anesthetic and hallucinogenic drugs. He'll be fine, he just needs to let the drugs wear off. If everything checks out tomorrow morning, he'll be free to go"

"Thank you, doctor," Carlton said automatically. After the doctor left, Carlton turned back to Shawn and said, "I better go call your dad then."

"Fishing," Shawn said, still staring up at the ceiling.

"Well, then Gus," Carlton said, turning to leave the room.

"Business trip," Shawn said, shaking his head slightly.

Carlton paused and frowned with his hand in his pocket lightly gripping his cellphone.

"I'll be right back," he said before leaving the room.

He went to the nearest men's bathroom and stood in a stall as he attempted to call Henry. The call went straight to voicemail and Carlton sighed in frustration. He didn't know Gus's number, but he was sure if he got it, Gus would be busy on his business trip. Flipping the cellphone shut, Carlton left the bathroom and went back to Shawn's room.

He could leave now that he knew what was effecting Shawn and was sure that he would be okay at the hospital, but after witnessing that screaming episode, Carlton knew he'd feel guilty if he just left the psychic to fend for himself. No, he'd stay just a little longer.

* * *

Shawn had never felt more confused in his entire life. 'Terrified' was also a good word to describe how he was feeling. Yes, confused and terrified covered the situation quite well. He didn't know what lead up to where he was at the moment. Looking back, it was too hazy. There was the Butcher and... something about a bar? He couldn't remember. 

He was angry with his mind for being so slow and hazy. He'd never really had this problem to this extent in the past. Maybe a slight drunken haze a few times, but nothing quite like this. Everything was usually so clear to him. It was supposed to be clear to him, but it wasn't now.

Time slowed down, sped up, and sometimes even skipped completely. One minute he was sitting, and then he was walking, then back to sitting again. He couldn't keep track of it all.

Then he'd float, and then he'd fall. Gravity would reverse itself and he had to hold onto the bed to keep from flying away and disappearing forever. The walls were too close and they folded together. His bed reached up and hugged him, telling him to rest, but he didn't want to rest.

Hadn't Carlton been here? He kept disappearing and reappearing like some sort of magician with an invisibility cloak, pulling rabbits out of his ears, but yes, Shawn remembered Carlton. The detective had been there the whole way. He didn't always look like Carlton, but Shawn knew it was him. Now where did he go?

And look at the lights, the lights were back from their trip across the universe. Wasn't that a movie, or was it a song? It didn't matter, the lights were back. Multicolored, iridescent lights that flowed like a river. They dance through the air and sang and laughed. They told jokes that made no sense, like how the mongoose crossed the road to escape the time-space continuum. Shawn still laughed though.

Screaming. The lights were screaming now, and they threw themselves against the wall, dieing. They broke apart, shredded, and everything was covered with their blood. The folded walls, the ceiling, drip-dripping with their blood, the floor pooled with it, and it soaked into the blankets covering him. It stained his skin and got into his eyes.

Tears ran down his face. He wanted to get away, but he could barely move. The blood was poisoning him, paralyzing him. He tossed his head to one side and _squish_ right against a blood soaked pillow.

It was all his fault too.

The lights, they were souls of the victims he fed to the Butcher. He did this to them. He led them to their demise. Why did he do it? Why did he feed the Butcher? The Butcher who was always hungry and would never stop, making Shawn its personal waiter for the rest of eternity. That's all he was. A waiter for a monster. He was no better than the monster.

Then Carlton was there in all his magnificent glory. He walked past the blood, not seeing it, not seeing the horror there. He was a man of justice who stopped the corrupted creatures that roamed the earth, and now Shawn was one of those creatures. Carlton came to stop him before he could truly cause a massive amount of damage.

His shuddering breaths grew quicker. He couldn't get enough air in, he was suffocating. No, he was hyperventilating. He wanted to get away. He wanted to breath easy and be free!

"Shawn, calm down. You're fine, everything's okay," came Carlton's soothing voice, a tone of voice he didn't usually hear from the detective.

It sounded muffled, but it was still calming and he _did_ hear it right. Carlton told him he was fine, so the detective wasn't there to stop him.

Maybe he didn't know yet.

No, calm down. He was fine. Everything was going to be okay.

"Deep breaths."

Shawn slowed his breathing. Deep breath in, deep breath out. He was fine.

The blood was still there though. Covering everything and haunting him. He could almost hear the screaming of the lights. Shawn wanted to escape. He wanted the blood to disappear. He needed a distraction, something to take him away. He needed to be saved.

Carlton was still there, hadn't yet gone away again. He seemed to radiate safety, good intentions, as if he descended from the heavens to fly Shawn away from the insanity.

Shawn reached out with a heavy arm and grabbed the man by his tie with desperate, adrenaline surging strength and pulled the detective down to him. Their lips locked and at first there was shock and bewilderment, but then the kiss deepened. The blood faded away and Shawn was flying. A wave of emotions plowed him down and then.. it all... _stopped_.

* * *

Carlton stared wide-eyed at the psychic who had fallen unconscious just moments before. Shawn kissed him, but not only did Shawn kiss him, he kissed back. Why did he kiss back? Anything Shawn did at this moment in time could be explained away by the drugs, but Carlton himself had no excuse. 

He almost raised a hand to his lips, but stopped himself. He wasn't some star-struck girl, he was a detective, he was a man. He was not supposed to get all weak in the knees over another man. He had an ex-wife, not an ex-husband.

Why did he kiss back?

He could lie to himself and say that it had been so long since he's had any sort of affectionate human contact and that he has his needs, but in a situation like that, he would've gone out to a bar and picked up a lady or something. Lady, woman, not guy.

So why the _hell_ did he kiss back?!

Carlton buried his face in his hands and groaned. He damned himself for ever even walking into the bar. Then again, this situation was better than the alternative where Shawn is taken by some sick weirdo who drugs people's drinks. He'd have to talk to the psychic about that in the morning when they were both in their right minds.

In a situation like this, he probably should have left at this point and meet up with Shawn at another time, but only to get his statement. Yes, leaving would have been the smart thing because, well, did he mention that he kissed back? Yet time ticked on and he stayed until eventually he fell asleep in his chair.

* * *

The next morning, both men woke up in a bit of a daze. Carlton's back was killing him and Shawn's mind was recovering after coming down from its drug trip. Shawn didn't really remember much of what happened the night before. Just going into the bar, having a few drinks, and the drinks being spiked by the bartender. After that, everything was just a mix of hazy images, but nothing that really made any sense. He was sure he would remember things eventually because he'd gotten drunk before and that was the way it usually went for him. 

"Lassi, uh, thanks for helping me out last night," Shawn said with a small smile. He didn't really remember anything Carlton did last night, but he was sure the detective helped somehow if he was still there in the morning.

"No problem," Carlton grunted, saying nothing more but eyeing Shawn a bit suspiciously. After an awkward moment of silence, he asked, "What do you remember of last night?"

"Barely anything," Shawn said truthfully as he attempted to think back. He briefly got a strange feeling in his stomach, like butterflies only better, but he shrugged the feeling off when nothing came to him.

"Oh, okay, good," Carlton said stiffly.

"Why?" Shawn asked with a raised eyebrow.

"No reason," Carlton said. "You just had some vivid hallucinations that didn't sound too pleasant."

Shawn just nodded and stared at Carlton curiously. The detective was acting stranger than usual, more closed up even.

Eyes widening in realization, Shawn asked hesitantly, "I didn't _do_ anything last night, did I?"

"What? No," Carlton said, waving away the question.

"You sure?" Shawn asked, not quite believing him. "I didn't... hit you or anything, did I?"

"You took a swing, but I can handle a drugged-up psychic," Carlton said dismissively.

"Psychic?" A smirk.

"_Fake_ psychic."

"Well, I'm really sorry about that anyway," Shawn said. One of the reasons why Shawn never drank a whole lot was because he has been known in the past to be an angry drunk. He limited the amount of alcohol he had to prevent this.

"Before you get signed out this morning, Spencer, it's my duty as a detective to ask you if you remember anything about who drugged your drink last night," Carlton said.

Carlton was giving him an opening to put an end to the whole thing. He could confess all he knew and get off easy while at the same time giving the police evidence toward finding the Butcher. No longer would he be assisting a serial killer and be an accessory in the biggest murder case in Santa Barbara's history.

Yet for some reason he said, "No, I can't remember a thing about last night."

"That's fine, but if you remember anything, tell me, alright?" Carlton said and Shawn nodded. "Great, now let's sign you out and get the hell out of here."

"Yeah, just hold on and let me change out of this hospital gown," Shawn said as he got up off the bed.

"I'll be outside the room," Carlton said, retreating out the door.

After getting signed out, Carlton dropped Shawn off at the bar to get his bike and the detective didn't drive away until Shawn was down the road and out of sight. He threw a dirty look at the bar itself, not really trusting the place.

When Carlton got to work that day, the algae results were there waiting for him. The algae on the rocks used to sink the bodies ended up being from various parts of Santa Barbara Harbor as well as near Marina beach which was fairly close to where Henry lived. Agent Vardez's solution was to put up cameras all around the area in hopes of catching any suspicious activity.

The only evidence recovered from the impounded car was a few strawberry leaves that were shriveled and dried up by now. He did all that work yesterday and all he had to show for it was a few useless strawberry leaves.

'_The guy can cover his tracks, I'll give him that,_' Carlton thought with a mental glare. '_He'll slip up eventually though._'

Because one of the Butcher's beaches was close to Henry's house, Carlton called him up to give him a heads up. He couldn't exactly come out and tell the man to watch out for the Butcher, but he could give him a bit of a warning. Along with that, he also wanted to give Henry the news on Shawn. Carlton figured the psychic wouldn't feel a need to divulge that information to his father, so _he_ might as well.

"Carlton, what can I do for you?" Henry greeted.

"I felt I should inform you that Shawn was drugged last night," Carlton said a bit bluntly, because there was really no nice way to put it.

"He was what?" Henry snapped. "Damn kid, where is he now?"

"He's fine," Carlton assured him. "I got him checked into the hospital last night and he checked out this morning."

"AMA?"

"No, he was okay to go," Carlton said.

"Well, thank you for telling me, Carlton, I doubt Shawn would've told me himself," Henry said with a sigh.

"It's no problem," Carlton said. "One more thing though. Keep any eye out for any suspicious activities near your place."

"...Suspicious activities?" Henry asked.

"By Marina Beach. I can't give you the details, but we have reason to believe that some things have been going on there that have to do with one of our cases. Just thought I'd let you know," Carlton said.

"..Yes, I think I understand.. Good talking with you Detective." Henry said before hanging up the phone.

Carlton hung up his own line, the call moving to the back of his mind and another problem more recently troubling moving forward. Why did he kiss back and why was he even still thinking about it in the first place? Shawn could remember the moment at all, so he was in the clear. He had nothing to worry about and yet he was still going over the whole thing in his mind.

He had calmed the psychic down from hyperventilating and then he was looking at him. In his delusion, he pulled Carlton down for a kiss and... Carlton kissed back.

He hated to admit it and he would probably _never_ admit it due to the circumstances, but he believed that perhaps the reason why he was_ still_ so bothered by the whole thing was because when he kissed back...

He actually liked it..

And now Shawn didn't even remember a thing.

* * *

The doors were locked up, closed early, and I stood in the soft glow of some old overhead lights in the bar's backroom. Everything around me was covered in plastic sheets and plastic wrap (mostly from the bartenders' own supplies. Oh, the irony). Setting up boxes of liquor, I made makeshift tables, two of them this time. Restrained to the table, also with plastic wrap, were my two playmates who were now just regaining consciousness. Around the 'tables,' I set up something that resembled a trough that would catch any spillage. 

All around the room, taped to the walls and racks filled with boxes of alcohol and _other items_ were pictures of all the victims as well as documentation to back up my choice for these two. Much of what was taped to the walls I had found in a box in the backroom while I had been setting up. It was risky going to a play date like this without all of the necessary evidence, but I considered Shawn being drugged by them evidence enough.

The two bartenders had been very naughty, as the pictures clearly proved. They liked to drug their unsuspecting victims and sell them off to other _naughty_ individuals as sex toys. A list of all their buyers is one piece of evidence I'll have to withhold from the authorities.

Sex. It is commonly the subject matter of many of my playmates' misdeeds. I just don't understand what the hype is all about.

"That's quite a lot of people," I commented to the now lucid bartenders as I gestured to all the pictures. I looked down at all my knives and other toys that were neatly lined up in a row on an empty shelf of one of the racks positioned closest to them. "You two have been busy boys."

Apparently having a good idea as to what was going on, the two screamed through their gags and struggled against their bindings.

"Now, now," I said calmly. "That's never helped anyone before, it's _not_ going to help you."

I approached the tables and they could fully see me now. One watched me with wide eyes blinded by fear and the other looked at me closely, as if thinking carefully about something.

"Don't recognize me?" I asked curiously. "Well, I have frequented your bar before, and now you know why."

Grabbing one of my favorite knives, Thorn (yes, I name them), I walked back over to them and turned my attention to the one that looked most frightened of me. Leaning down close to his face, I whispered, "I'm going to remove your gag now. If you scream, I'll cut out your tongue. Do you understand?"

He nodded to the best of his ability against the plastic wrap restraining his head. Satisfied, I removed his gag and as expected, he remained quiet.

"Good," I said. "Now tell me, how many people have you personally drugged? I see around fifty pictures up there, so it has to be a high number."

"I.. I d-don't know," he said, his voice shaking. "I never counted."

I frowned down at him as I said, "An estimate then. How many?"

I didn't like estimates. I liked exact numbers that truthfully answered the question.

"Twenty-four, maybe," he said, unsure. "Some of them were a joint effort between the two of us."

"Good boy," I said as I replaced the gag. Turning to the other bartender, I asked, "And you, how many did you drug? Remember, I'll cut out your tongue if you scream."

I removed his gag and he snarled at me, "What the hell do you want from us?"

Looking around the room before looking back down at him, I said, "I would think it is obvious."

"You'll never get away with this!" he snapped.

"Oh, but I will, and I have _many_ times before," I said pleasantly. "Now, how many?"

"That wuss over there did twenty-two, I did thirty and there were five split between us," he finally said.

I put his gag back on too while saying to myself, "Five split between twenty-two and thirty would logically add it up to twenty-four point five and thirty-two point five."

I've never done point five before. How exciting.

Walking back over to my toys, I delicately touched each knife and each tool I brought for the night before turning back around to my two playmates.

"I don't usually do two at once," I told them with a fake smile. "I have a couple times in the past, but, well, I'm sure you can see how special this is to me."

Especially with the point five.

"Do you see those bottles over there?" I asked, using my knife to point.

They couldn't see all of them from their positions on the tables, but they could see a good amount. The bottles were of all various shapes and sizes and all of them came from the bartenders' supplies. I spent a good hour or so just dumping alcohol down the drain while the two slept.

"There are a lot of them, aren't there?" I commented. "Well, there needs to be a lot of them because I'm going to chop you up small enough to fit you inside of them."

They both went pale and then turned a light shade of green.

"What do you think would be better? Should I mix you together like a mixed fruit smoothie or should I separate you into different categories such as bones, arms, legs, and so on?"

Any input they had was muffled by the gags.

"I guess I'll just see how I feel when I get there," I said with a shrug.

Walking over to a small CD player that was also the bartenders', I pressed play and Chopin: Nocturnes filled the room. The CD was mine. I adjusted the extra long rubber gloves going up to my elbows, making sure they were on just right.

"Nocturne number two, E flat. My favorite," I said with a peaceful sigh. Walking over to my toys, I put down the knife and grabbed a medium sized electric bone saw.

"By the time this CD is done playing, you will be dead," I stated, admiring the saw. I went over to the one that feared me most, Mr.24.5. I would kill him first so that the other one would see exactly what I was going to do to him. You know, bring him down a few pegs. He was too cocky for his own good anyway.

"I'm going to need your hand now," I told him, turning on the saw. I pulled the plastic face shield down over my face before bringing the saw down against his wrist. There was only a slight spray of blood while the rest dribbled over the table's edge and into the trough.

Ignoring the muffled screams from both men, I focused instead on the sound of the CD and the buzzing of the saw. Grabbing the dismembered hand, I put it aside for now.

After all, I needed something to write the number of deaths down on.

* * *

_That's the end of chapter 6! Hope ya'll are liking it so far. Didn't know any beaches or anything at Santa Barbara, so I made them up. I think the Santa Barbara Harbor is real though. _

_Review please!_


	7. Chapter Seven: Disowned

_Hello everyone! Here's chapter 7 for you all and with it, a bit of a revelation on the Butcher. _

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

**Chapter Seven: Disowned**

Sometime in the past...

_I stood before the front door of my house, hesitant to go inside. Earlier on, Dad had walked in on me killing one of my play mates. The man had already been dead and I had been pretty far along in my work when Dad walked through the door, so obviously the sight couldn't be considered 'pretty' by _normal _standards. _

_I thought it was 'pretty' though. I had just recently gotten my new set of knives, custom made, and was using them for the first time on my play mate. The blades were clear and the hilts were a pure, clean white. They did beautiful work and I think I might just have to name them later on. Such amazing tools deserve names, after all. _

_However, dad didn't think it was pretty. He turned paler than the corpse I was cutting up. He looked close to vomiting, but thankfully didn't. _

_"Dad, I'm just finishing up. I should be back in time for dinner," I said as I set my knife down and went over to him. _

_He backed away though, and looked distraught, angry even. _

_I frowned, "Sorry I didn't pick a more secretive location. I'll be more careful next time." _

_That must be what he's angry about. Obviously I didn't pick a secluded enough spot if he's found me. He must be worried about our family. _

_He took another step back and whispered, "Stay away from me. Just... stay away." _

_Then he fled the scene. _

_I frowned again and wanted to go after him, but I knew I couldn't just leave my work behind, that would upset Dad even more. I turned back to the body and decided to clean up and go. The mood had been ruined, so there was no point in continuing. I bagged up the body and my supplies and put them in the trunk of the car. I'd take them out in the boat and dump them in the harbor later. I had to see what was wrong with Dad first. _

_Standing before the front door, I went in with a sigh. I found him pacing around the kitchen, looking troubled. I didn't understand it. Granted, he had never seem me kill a person before, but still, he knew what I did. He's seen me kill animals numerous times. He also knew the man deserved it. Every person I killed did. _

_"Dad, what's wrong?" _

_"Don't!" he snapped. "Don't call me that." _

_Now I _really_ didn't understand. _

_"What? Dad-" _

_"You're not my son," he hissed dangerously. _

_Suddenly everything was put into perspective for me; the reason why he always called me 'kid' and never 'son.' No, technically I wasn't his son, but I didn't think technicalities mattered to him. Guess I was wrong. _

_"Oh, I see how it is," I said with a glare. "So suddenly I'm not your son anymore. I'm just a **monster** that's tainting your **happy** little family. Well I'm a monster **you** created!" _

_"No," he said adamantly. "You were born a monster from a situation I had no control over!" _

_"You had control!" I shouted, angry with him about The Event for the first time in my life. "You could have done something. You could have stopped it if you had tried hard enough, but you didn't. You weren't there to stop him!" _

_"Go to your room!" he shouted. "I don't want to see you for the rest of the night." _

_I stormed away, and as I left, I could hear him say, "I should have stopped this when I saw the signs."_

* * *

After getting home, when nighttime came, Shawn really didn't want to sleep knowing that the Butcher could sneak into his house at any given moment. So he settled down on the couch with a bowl of popcorn and opted to stay awake watching TV for the rest of the night. However, Shawn's body had other plans and before he knew it, he had drifted off into the Land of Nod. 

While he slept, he dreamed, or rather, he remembered. He was laying in the hospital bed, freaking out over something he couldn't quite remember, and Carlton was there by his bedside. Of all the things he could have done at that moment, he pulled Carlton down for a kiss.

A kiss. He kissed Carlton, and yet the detective hadn't killed him because of it.

It was around one-thirty PM when he finally woke up, and while he had been known to sleep late in the past, this was just ridiculous. Of course, he hadn't set his alarm clock to wake him up because he didn't expect to fall asleep, but still, one-thirty PM? Maybe eleven AM without a wake-up call, but not one-thirty in the afternoon.

Brushing off his odd sleeping patterns with a sigh, Shawn focused his attention on an even bigger problem he had.

He had kissed Carlton that night in the hospital, that he was sure of, but he couldn't really remember anything of the kiss or any response to the kiss. At the moment, the only reaction he could go by was how awkward the detective had been acting the next day. Also, it was a little hard to judge your own reaction when you barely even remember the event.

Shawn had experimented in the past when he was a teen, and not all of the experiments were bad, but that was several years back. The last guy he'd ever been with was when he was twenty-one and after that it has only been women for him.

Yet a part of him was curious about the whole thing. In the back of his mind danced the question: What was it like? Was it good?

Carlton was an interesting man. Uptight, but interesting. He wasn't too bad on the eyes either, and Shawn would be lying if he said he'd never mused over what it would be like to _be_ with the detective.

Still, he had to make peace with the situation because they were practically coworkers and were bound to be working on cases in the future. So Shawn put his curiosity aside and decided to bring the detective a coffee just the way he liked it. Leaning against Carlton's desk, he slid the hot drink over to the man as a silent apology.

'_Sorry I flipped out on you and kissed you. Bet they don't have a card for that,_' Shawn thought to himself before asking with an easy-going smile, "How's the case going?"

"We have no new leads," Carlton actually admitted with a grumble. "Everything's a dead end."

"I can help," Shawn said automatically.

"You know you can't," Carlton said, referring to the FBI agent's order.

Remembering just who he was currently working for, Shawn said with a frown, "You're right. I can't."

Carlton looked a little surprised when he said that, but said nothing himself. Instead, he took a nice long sip of his coffee, nodding at Shawn in thanks. Smiling again, Shawn knew that now would be the opportune time to leave, but he didn't. Continuing to lean against the desk, his gaze traveled around the station. Everyone was busy doing their own thing and yet activity in the Butcher's room seemed to be at a stand-still.

'_Looks like my employer has them stumped,_' he thought, then mentally winced. He didn't want to think of the Butcher that way even though it was true. Blissful ignorance would allow him to believe he was just finding evidence on certain people for a client and disregard what said client did with that evidence.

"Is there anything I can help you with, Spencer? Such as showing you the door?" Carlton asked, falling back into the roll of uptight head detective, and snapping Shawn out of his thoughts at the same time.

'_No,_' he should have said. '_I can see myself out._'

But he was still curious, and he'd never been able to fight his curiosity in the past, so there was no way he was beating it today.

"Actually," Shawn said. "I was wondering if you wanted to go grab some lunch. I want to talk to you about some things."

"I can't right now, I'm swamped with the Butcher case and other cases as well," he said.

"Oh," Shawn frowned, standing up straight.

"I get out at seven though. How about dinner instead?" Carlton asked, surprising the psychic.

It took Shawn a moment to find his voice before he said, "Sure, dinner works. Uh, I can pick you up from here."

"There's no way I'm riding that death trap of a motorcycle," Carlton said. "I'll pick you up."

"I'll be at Psych then," Shawn said with a smile before turning to leave. "See you tonight."

As Shawn disappeared out the front doors of the station, Carlton was left wondering why he agreed to go have dinner with the younger man. Noticing Juliet out of the corner of his eye, standing there with an odd smile on her face, he turned to her and snapped, "What are you smiling about? Shouldn't you be busy working? I think Agent Vardez was looking for you a few minutes ago."

"What? He was?" she sputtered, looking around herself as if the FBI agent would materialize out of thin air. "Cruel, Carlton. Very cruel," she said as she retreated.

* * *

As promised, Carlton picked Shawn up at Psych. Neither man really had a preference as to where they should eat, so they stopped at the first nice looking restaurant they came across. Dinner was a bit awkward for the both of them, to say the least. Carlton still had half his attention set on the kiss between them. He didn't know what Shawn wanted to talk to him about anyway, and he was waiting for the younger man to speak up. 

Shawn, meanwhile, was trying to get himself to just come out and say that he remembered kissing Carlton when he was drugged. He couldn't manage to form the words though, and he was even a little nervous as to what the detective's reaction would be. What if Carlton was happy Shawn had forgotten and wanted to put the whole thing behind them?

"Good food," Shawn said, both stalling and attempting to break the awkward silence between them.

"Spencer, you told me you wanted to talk to me about some things," Carlton said, a bit frustrated. "So talk."

"Oh, you know, just small talk," Shawn said with a shrug. "Just wanted to know how you've been doing lately. I wanted to thank you again for driving me to the hospital, apologize for trying to hit you and I also _kinda_ rememberthekiss." He shoved a few pieces of chicken into his mouth. "Really good food right? Amazing! How's yours?"

Carlton paused in chewing his steak and took a moment to process what he heard the psychic say. Swallowing heavily, he asked, "You.. remember the kiss?"

Shawn nodded silently.

"Look," Carlton said. "It was the heat of the moment, I get that you were high and I really didn't mean to kiss back but-"

"Wait, you kissed back?" Shawn asked incredulously.

Carlton froze, then said in confusion, "You just told me you remembered it!"

"Kinda, I said I _'kinda_' remembered it," Shawn corrected him.

At that moment, Carlton would have liked nothing better than to slink away and erase the whole fiasco from existence.

"Check!" he called out, "Can I get a check over here?"

"Oh great, now you're embarrassed," Shawn said, absentmindedly tearing his napkin to shreds. "Don't be embarrassed. Why should you be? Like you said, it was the heat of the moment. We were both confused. Hey, maybe there was something in your drink too but you didn't drink enough of it because I knocked it over. You're _welcome_, by the way."

"I am _not_ having this conversation with you right now or _ever,_ for that matter," Carlton hissed, before shouting, "Check! For the love of God, _check!_"

"Did you like it?" Shawn asked curiously. "Is that why you're embarrassed?"

"Don't be ridiculous, Spencer," Carlton said, the muttered to himself, "Your meal plus my meal... A thirty-five should cover that plus the tip."

Seeing Carlton pull the cash out of his wallet, Shawn said, "You don't need to pay for my meal. We were going to split it, remember?"

"I'm leaving," was all the detective said before getting up and speed-walking away.

"Wait, you're my ride," Shawn said, getting up and running after him.

Carlton was already out the door by the time Shawn caught up and he followed the detective out to the car.

"Why are you acting so strange?" Shawn asked, walking over to the passenger's side door.

"I'm not acting strange," Carlton protested, getting into the driver's side and pulling out his keys. "I'm acting perfectly normal for a guy in this position. _You're_ the one who's acting strange!"

"I didn't realize you were so homophobic," Shawn mused as he sat down in the passengers seat and buckled up.

"I am _not_ homophobic! There is nothing wrong with being gay. I just.." he ran out of words to describe what he was 'just,' and he fell silent. Sitting in his seat, staring forward with the car off and the keys in his hand.

Shawn stared at the detective with a frown, trying to figure out what was going through his head and get a reading off of what this was really all about.

"Carly," he said seriously, and the detective looked over at him. "I get it. Denial, right? And you're unsure. You're a creature of habit and this sort of thing would take you completely off the path. That's fine. If it makes you this uncomfortable, I'll drop it and we can forget about the whole thing."

He still said nothing.

"Something like this should be right for both of us," Shawn said. "Or else it'll be wrong."

Letting go of the steering wheel, Carlton leaned forward and kissed Shawn. It was a tentative kiss, more of a test really. After a moment they both pulled away.

"I liked that," Shawn said, his lips quirked in a small smile. His curiosity was satisfied. It had been good, very good. Carlton had yet to say anything, so Shawn hesitantly asked, "But.. did you like it?"

"I did like it," Carlton finally admitted out loud.

Shawn frowned. The detective may have liked it, but he still looked a little uncomfortable with the whole thing.

"I'm all for this, Carlton, but the next move is up to you," Shawn said.

Coming to a decision, Carlton said, "This isn't something we can broadcast to the station, you know."

"I know," Shawn said. "So what does this mean for us?"

"I'm willing to try it out if you are," Carlton said, looking over at Shawn while fiddling with the car keys. Putting the keys in the ignition, he said, "It's getting late. I'll drop you off, but.. how about another date tomorrow? An actual date?"

"Does dinner time work for you?" Shawn asked with a grin.

"Yeah, same time tomorrow."

* * *

After dropping Shawn off, Carlton got a call on his cellphone from Juliet. 

"How was _dinner?_" she asked and he could easily see the evil grin on her face.

"Is there a reason you're calling me, O'Hara?" Carlton deadpanned.

"Yes, actually," she said. "The Butcher has struck again. We need you to come down to Rattlesnake Tavern."

Rattlesnake Tavern? Why did that sound so familiar?

His eyes widened in realization.

"Do you need directions? It's on Olive street just off of East Haley street," she said.

"Yeah, I know, I've heard of the place," he said vaguely, turning his car around and heading for the bar.

"See you there," she said before hanging up.

Rattlesnake Tavern was the very same bar that Shawn had been drugged at. Somehow Carlton didn't think it was a coincidence that the Butcher displayed his victim there. It seemed a tad suspicious though that only a day after Shawn had been drugged, the Butcher struck the very same place.

Carlton decided to keep this little bit of information to himself for now until he was sure of all the facts. The last thing he needed was that FBI agent jumping to conclusions and accusing Shawn of being involved with the case.

Carlton parked among all of the other police vehicles and crossed the police tape to get inside. Pushing through the front door, he was met with a sight just as gruesome as the one found at the CVS. Neatly set up on the bar itself were dozens upon dozens of bottles of all shapes and sizes. Beer bottles, wine bottles, champagne, vodka, the list goes on. Within each bottle was a multicolored slurry, the most prominent color being red.

In the front, middle of all the bottles was a rather large bottle with two dismembered hands placed around it. Carved into one of the hands was the roman numeral XXIV.V and in the other hand was XXXII.V.

"Let me guess," Carlton sighed as he came to stand next to Juliet. "Our victims are in the bottles."

"You guess it right," Juliet said with a grimace. "I don't know what the point-five is about though."

Looking at all the different pictures taped to the wall behind the bottles as well as what looked to be some documentation, Carlton said, "I'm sure we'll find out eventually."

"Here, come look at this," Juliet said, grabbing him by the hand and dragging him closer to the display. "You mentioned finding strawberry leaves in the abandoned car?"

"Yeah," Carlton confirmed.

Juliet pointed to the largest bottle the hands were around without actually touching it, and Carlton leaned in closer for a better look. The bottle seemed to be filled with watered-down blood, and floating around inside the bottle were two sets of eyeballs and a single strawberry.

"His 'calling card,' maybe?" he wondered out loud, and Juliet shrugged.

Looking back at the pictures again, Carlton couldn't help but notice that Shawn's picture wasn't up there.

'_Probably because he got away._'

* * *

Shawn woke up the next morning with a frustrated sigh. He'd managed to stay awake for half of the night, mostly bugging Gus on the phone, but sleep eventually came for him after Gus hung up on him. 

Walking into the kitchen, he stopped and stared at the paper taped to his fridge that hadn't been there the night before. He slowly approached the fridge, as if worried that the paper would come alive and eat him, and leaned down to get a closer look.

It was a list of names. A rather long list of names, and next to each name was a date, a code of numbers, and an amount of money. Taped to the list was a small note that had been printed off of a computer. It said:

_You may have to travel abroad._

* * *

Detective Lassiter and Shawn... _together._ This is going to be a problem I would have rather avoided. With those two dating, it'll only be a matter of time before Lassiter notices something suspicious about Shawn and learns of our involvement with each other. 

Shawn just doesn't think sometimes. I don't know what made him think dating the detective working on a case he's directly involved in was a good idea. His attraction for the detective made him ignorant and blind to the danger we now face.

An easy solution would be to get rid of the detective. Unfortunately, Lassiter leads a clean life, and not only that, but Shawn would be quite upset if I were to do such a thing. The last thing I want to do is upset Shawn and I doubt he'd work with me after something like that.

That still leaves me stuck in a corner though.

I could try to manipulate them into breaking up, but doing that would put me even more at risk. Exposure is the last thing I want to happen. It would ruin everything. It's just not an option.

The only other thing I could come up with was for Shawn to leave. That's just wistful thinking though. I know he's not going to just up and leave to help me track down my wayward play mates. He'll probably just do his research from Santa Barbara. Still, I felt the comment was necessary, and when it comes time to go hunting out of state, Shawn's not going to have much choice in the matter anyway.

* * *

_That's the end of chapter seven! So, yes, the Butcher has been revealed to be a guy. Hopefully the whole dinner scene came out okay. (whines) Romance is hard! (clears throat) More to come, probably next Thursday. _

_Review please!_


	8. Chapter Eight: Poison

_Hello everyone! Here's chapter 8 for you all._

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

**Chapter Eight: Poison**

Sometime in the past...

_A couple years had passed since I was disowned and yet I still saw my 'father' on a regular basis. Since that night, Dad seemed to have lost his spirit around me. He was ashamed of me, ashamed of the monster I was. Still, the fact of the matter was that I wasn't going away. He knew it and he hated me because of it. _

_It was nighttime again and I sat at the dinner table as usual. Before me was an empty plate and across the table was another empty plate. Dad puttered around the kitchen, getting the last of the food ready for dinner in silence. _

_As I studied the lonely spoon beside my plate, I spoke up, "I really wish you wouldn't hide my knives. I'll find them eventually, you know." _

_He said nothing and I frowned. It really was impolite of him. He'd throw a hissy fit if I hid his tools. He kept doing it though, and each time it became harder to find them. I sighed. I didn't like being separated from Thorn, Milo, and Buffy. (Yes, that's right, Buffy. The girl had the right idea when it came to vampires). They were my favorite knives. _

_Dad finally came over to the table with the food. It looked to be some sort of casserole. He set it down on the table without a word. _

_"Dad," I said, stopping him before he could go get drinks. "Are you sure the casserole's done?" _

_He stood there, not looking me in the eyes. A minute passed before he sighed and picked the casserole up off the table. Without even bothering to be sneaky, he dumped the casserole in the trash before picking up the phone to order take-out. _

_It was a weekly ritual of his, trying to poison my dinner. He could never go through with it though. Even if I didn't call him on it, he would always stop me before I took a bite, and throw the food away. There was no quick, easy way to get rid of me, at least, not one that he had the heart to go through with._

* * *

It took much research, but Shawn had the location of most of the people on the list. Only two of them lived in Santa Barbara, three more lived in surrounding towns, one lived a ways away, but still in California, and the rest were scattered about the United States. He still didn't have a clue as to what they've all done, but he believed they were all guilty of the same crime considering the Butcher presented them in one list. He had started going deeper in his research on the two that lived in Santa Barbara. If he could figure out what they did, he'd probably know what the rest did. 

Although Shawn had been generally successful in his research, working on cases for the Butcher was wearing away at his nerves. On top of having to be wary around Carlton with his cases, he also had to worry about whoever it was that kept tailing him. His stalker was tricky and kept changing vehicles so that he wouldn't immediately know that someone was following him. So whenever Shawn went out to work on cases, he had to be cautious of every vehicle out there and everyone out there for that matter. His stalker could be standing in plain sight, after all.

On top of all that, Shawn still had to worry about the Butcher breaking into his house. He also wondered how the serial killer knew of all the information Shawn dug up on the different cases. The Butcher couldn't have known when he broke in because Shawn wouldn't stupidly leave a paper trail around, so the more likely answer was that the Butcher was closer than he thought. That meant having to watch out for not only Carlton and his stalker, but also for any possible person that could be the Butcher.

Shawn wouldn't be surprised if he had an anxiety attack from all that was piling up on his shoulders. He was already suffering from stress-induced insomnia, and whenever he actually did fall asleep, he just woke up feeling more tired than before. He couldn't really complain about the insomnia though. He'd rather be awake and aware if the Butcher broke in than being asleep and vulnerable.

Quickly scanning the road for any suspicious cars, Shawn adjusted the fake electrician's hat that matched with his shirt before casually walking up to the house of one of the Butcher's suspects. The man was at work and as far as Shawn knew, the house was empty. Walking the perimeter of the house, he pretended to check for wires while looking into the windows at the same time.

'_Nothing,_' he concluded after his search.

The house was empty of anything suspicious. He started to walk away when he heard a faint tapping that drew his attention to the small cellar window at the base of the house's foundation. Kneeling down in the mulch, he looked through the dirty window and could see a woman down there. She was sitting on the ground with her back against one of the house's support beams. Her arms were stretched behind her and wrapped around it. She definitely didn't look like a happy guest of the house.

That was probably exactly what the Butcher was looking for and Shawn would have loved nothing better than to break into the house and get her. He stood up and for a moment, he struggled with himself. He wanted to go down there, he wanted to do something that wouldn't result in someone else's death. He knew he couldn't though. It would be too dangerous, too suspicious. Questions would be asked that he couldn't answer.

_What were you doing there? Why were you posing as an electrician? You know something, you're hiding something._

Somehow Shawn didn't think a psychic vision could cover his tracks, and while he knew the Chief would let it slide, that thorn-in-his-side FBI agent definitely wouldn't.

Very reluctantly, Shawn walked away from the house. He had the evidence he needed. Everything else would be taken care of for him.

* * *

Carlton sat at his desk reviewing the files on Butcher's most recent victims. There had been two more murders after what is now known around the station as the 'blood bottling incident.' The murder to happen after the bottles was of Wanda Cladstine, the woman who kidnapped and murdered children. Her face had been painted up like that of a Barbie doll's and her insides were scooped out and replaced with cotton stuffing. As for her innards, they had been neatly packaged up in a thick plastic container and sewed up inside a large stuffed bear like some sort of nightmarish Build-a-Bear Workshop creation. 

The murder after that one was the most recent. The man's name had been James Avery and the victim of the crime he committed had been found still alive and in the basement of his home. The woman had been there for months and said in her statement that the last thing she remembered before finding herself trapped in Avery's house was drinking at Rattlesnake Tavern. This linked her to the blood bottling incident.

Assuming that the Butcher was going after all of the Bartender's buyers, they finally had a lead that might get them somewhere on the case. At the moment, half of the task force was busy trying to find out who else had done business with the two bartenders. They weren't having too much success on the whole thing though.

As for the fate of James Avery, he had been displayed naked for everyone to see, strung up in the shower by his ankles. The handcuffs holding him up had been looped through a strong steel hook nailed to the wall. The Butcher slit him open from gut to throat and yet there wasn't a single drop of blood in the white bathtub Avery hung over. Anything that would have fallen out was sealed up in a Tupperware contain complete with a red bow on top.

Whoever the Butcher was, he was mocking them.

When asked if she heard anything that could give them a clue to the Butcher's identity, the woman from the basement claimed that she heard nothing, not even a slight scuffle upstairs.

Carlton set the papers aside on his desk with a mental sigh. He was finding it difficult to concentrate of the case when half his attention was on Shawn. They'd gone on several more dates since that night and surprisingly they really hit it off. Carlton was actually becoming attached to the psychic. When he agreed to go out on another date, deep down he never truly expected their dating to end up where it was. Now he was actually looking forward to their dates. He found he enjoyed the other man's company and it was a distraction from the gruesome horrors he dealt with at work.

They kept the whole thing secret, even from Shawn's father and from Gus. Juliet may know something about it, but she never says anything, just smiles, so Carlton's not too worried out her outing them.

Recently though, something had seriously been bothering Shawn and Carlton couldn't figure out what it was. The psychic always claimed that it was nothing, that he was fine, but Carlton could easily see through the lie. The younger man obviously wasn't getting enough sleep if the bags under his eyes were anything to go by. Shawn was acting jittery and neurotic, and more than once, Carlton caught him looking over his shoulder, as if expecting someone to be there.

He was worried about Shawn and was tempted to slip the psychic some sleeping pills.

At least Gus had just recently returned. Perhaps he could help Shawn with whatever it was that was bothering him.

Secretly, Carlton hated that Shawn would most likely go to Gus with his problems rather than him. A part of the detective wondered if _he_ was the problem.

* * *

Shawn walked into the station, automatically plastering that cheerfully carefree smile on his face. In his hands, he held two coffees; one for Juliet and the other for Carlton. Spotting Juliet who was avoiding Agent Vardez as usual, he handed her the coffee with his usual greeting, asking how she was. 

"I'm good," she said, smiling in thanks for the coffee. "You look like a raccoon though."

"Really? Because Gus said panda," Shawn said.

"Are you okay?" she asked, concerned.

"I'm fine, really, I am," he assured her, waving off her concern.

"If you're sure.." she said, not sounding too convinced.

"Is that Agent Vardez?" he asked, looking over her shoulder.

"What?" she said in a panicked tone as she twisted around to look behind herself. Sure enough, Agent Vardez was coming their way. "Gotta go." she said, bolting off in the direction of the ladies room.

"O'Hara, hold up a second!" the FBI agent called, passing by Shawn as if he wasn't even there.

Shaking his head with a brief, genuine smile, Shawn headed off to find Carlton. The detective wasn't at his desk. Shawn frowned, looking around the station for the older man. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Carlton leave through some swinging doors. Sticking on that fake smile again, Shawn went after him.

The door led to a hallway full of other doors, and Shawn caught a glimpse of the last door down at the end of the hallway closing. Walking down the hallway with the coffee in hand, he opened the last door and stepped through without a second thought.

Carlton's nickname died in his throat as his mind took in the room he just walked into, details and images automatically seared into his brain. Damn his eidetic memory.

He walked right into the morgue.

The walls were made of some sort of thick plastic that kept the cool air in and the bodies preserved. There were tables everywhere, scattered about, dozens of them, and on each table was the body of a victim, or at least what was left. Shawn had seen dead bodies before, and he'd even seen pictures of these particular bodies, but seeing it in person like this was so much more different. It all looked much more gruesome than anything he'd seen before, and he felt a personal connection to it all due to his working with the killer responsible for it.

Next to each body was a name identifying it, and Shawn's eyes were immediately drawn to the three he was responsible for. Wanda lay there, split open with traces of red-stained cotton stuffing on her. James Avery had been cut open and cleaned out too. The bottles stacked up on another table apparently held the two bartenders.

It was like a train wreck that he couldn't look away from, a train wreck that he caused. As he stared down at their remains, he repeatedly told himself that they deserved it. Wanda killed children, the bartenders drugged him and probably others, and James had kidnapped a woman and did who knows what to her. They deserved it. This had to be right, right?

And yet... _nobody_ deserved this. It was inhumane, even for the people who weren't all that human on the inside in the end.

"Shawn? What are you doing in here," he heard Carlton's voice ask from behind him, sounding aghast. "You shouldn't be in here."

"I brought you coffee," he replied lamely with a dead tone, still not looking up from the bodies.

Shawn felt himself being pulled away, back through the door and into the hallway outside the morgue.

Hands on his shoulders, forcing Shawn to look at him, Carlton asked, "Are you okay?"

"I-" Shawn's voice broke, he couldn't bring himself to say he was okay, so instead, he held up the coffee and said, "Here."

Carlton accepted the coffee, but kept his eyes on Shawn. Sighing, he said, "I didn't want you to see that. Nobody should have to see that."

"You shouldn't have to see that," Shawn mumbled, suddenly feeling very tired.

"Are you going to be okay?" Carlton asked again, but Shawn said nothing. "I could take the rest of today off, we could do something."

Shaking his head slowly, Shawn said, "No. Stay at work."

"Do you want to talk about it?" Carlton asked and Shawn shook his head 'no' again. "You know I'm always here if you need to talk."

"I'll be.." Shawn paused before managing to grind out, "_fine._"

'_I don't think I can do this anymore,_' Shawn thought, looking away from the detective's concerned gaze. '_Lying, sneaking around and... being an accessory to this crime._'

He felt so tired of the stress, of everything. Shawn just wanted to go to bed and actually get a good night's sleep, but he couldn't. His apartment wasn't safe. It would never be safe.

"Can I go sleep at your place?" Shawn finally asked, then added, "There's a bug problem at mine."

Carlton looked surprised by the request for a moment, but recovered and said, "Yeah, sure you can."

"Thanks," Shawn said gratefully.

"Are you sure you don't want me to take the rest of today off?" Carlton asked, not really wanting to leave Shawn alone. After seeing something as horrifying as the morgue, the psychic might be unpredictable.

"I'm sure," Shawn said. "When does your shift end?"

"I work until ten tonight," Carlton said with a sigh. "You can go ahead and make yourself something to eat, I'll have to miss dinner."

"Okay," Shawn said, walking down the hall and back into the main section of the station with Carlton by his side.

Carlton gave him a spare key to the house before he left. Hopping on his motorcycle, Shawn rode off to the detective's house. He had only been there once before and that was just because he wanted to know where Carlton relocated to in case he needed to bug the detective.

Unlocking the door and stepping inside, Shawn collapsed on the couch and fell asleep.

* * *

It was dark out when Shawn finally woke up to the sound of his stomach growling. Looking at his watch, he saw that it was around nine at night, so Carlton would still be at the station. Dragging himself up off the couch, Shawn made his way into the kitchen to get something to eat. 

Opening up the fridge, his eyes were immediately drawn to the bowl of strawberries placed carefully in the front, center of the fridge on the top shelf, and protruding from the strawberries was a small note with four words:

_Don't get too close._

Shawn stood before the fridge, panic surging through his veins. He read the small note over and over again as if the words might change.

'_He knows where Carlton lives,_' he thought, a sense of dread rising up and washing over him.

Carlton was a paranoid man and very few knew where he currently lived. If the Butcher could get access to Carlton's address, what's to stop him from find out where Gus lives, or Shawn's dad or even Shawn's mom? The serial killer probably already knew all of that information, and could use it to his advantage if he wanted to.

"This has gone too far," he whispered to himself.

Shawn had no trouble putting himself in danger, but putting everyone he knew and cared about in danger? That just wasn't an option. He had to stop, he _wanted_ to stop, but he was in it too deep now. Just _stopping_ probably wasn't an option in the Butcher's opinion.

For a brief moment, he imagined what it would be like if all of those bodies in the morgue had actually been the people he knew.

'_I've been so stupid!_' Shawn thought, berating himself.

If he wanted to get himself out of this mess, he'd need help. He'd need to come clean.

Stumbling through the unfamiliar dark house, he grabbed the cordless phone off its charge and began dialing. Pausing, he suddenly wondered if the Butcher was watching him right now and knew what he was doing. Who's to say the killer even left the house?

Shawn immediately flipped on the living room light switch that he had remembered seeing by the door when he entered. Damn it, he should have locked it after. Not that it would have mattered. The Butcher always got into his apartment whether the door was locked or not. Standing with his back to a corner so that he could see everything in the room and anything that might come through the doors or windows, Shawn re-dialed the number.

* * *

Carlton had been close to finishing his shift and was in the process of collecting the files together when his cell phone rang. Seeing on the caller ID that it was his house phone calling, he picked up and said, "Hey, I'm heading out now." 

"I lied," Shawn said, and Carlton raised a confused eyebrow. "I'm not fine. In fact, everything is very wrong right now. I screwed up, I did something really _stupid_ and now I can't get myself out of it. I need help."

"Slow down and tell me what you're talking about," Carlton said while absentmindedly slipping some files into his desk drawer.

"The... the Butcher contacted me," Shawn hesitantly said.

Carlton almost dropped the phone, but managed to compose himself and asked as calmly as he could, "He contacted you just now?"

"Well, no, a while back," Shawn said and Carlton's grip on the phone tightened. "He left me a message on a CD."

"So it's a 'he'?" Carlton asked.

"I'm not sure, he used a voice changer," Shawn explained. "And... he wanted to hire me to help him find evidence against his victims. I thought... maybe I could use that to my advantage to get closer to him, and I was just so angry, I wasn't _thinking._"

"Of course you weren't," Carlton could help but say, eyes closed in frustration.

Shawn paused at the comment, before continuing on to say, "He kept leaving me messages; names and information like that... He left me the messages in my apartment, he broke in and I don't even know how because I would lock the door. I thought maybe I'd be safe at your place, but he left another message."

"I'm coming home right now," Carlton said, grabbing his jacket and his keys. "Is the door locked?"

"No, I-"

"Lock it now, I'll be there as soon as I can," Carlton said before ending the call and slipping the phone in his pocket.

He was out of the station and into his car faster than the remaining few people at the station could blink. Pulling out of the parking lot, he sped home and got there in record time. Pulling his keys out, he unlocked the door and called out to reassure the psychic that it was just him.

"I am so, _so sorry_" Shawn said, hugging him and sounding extremely happy to not be alone in the house any longer.

"It's fine," Carlton said because he could tell Shawn already had enough stress to deal with, he didn't need Carlton to lecture him about how dangerous and stupid he'd been. Later maybe, but not now.

Pulling out his gun, Carlton did a quick check of the house, making sure that they were the only two there. Everything was safe, there were no present intruder.

"Where's the message?" Carlton asked, putting his gun away, but making sure he could grab it quickly if he needed to.

"It's in the fridge," Shawn said, walking over and pulling the fridge door open.

Carlton kneeled down to get a closer look at the bowl of strawberries, asking as he read the message, "'Don't get too close'?"

"I don't think he likes us being together, considering you're working on his case and all," Shawn said, his eyes downcast.

Sighing, Carlton quietly asked, "How many did you help him with?"

"The four most recent ones..." Shawn said.

"That didn't seem wrong to you at all?" Carlton asked with a low growl.

"Not at the time," Shawn admitted. "Seeing all those pictures that Wanda had of the dead children, and that woman tied up in the basement. It kinda felt right."

"What about the two bartenders?" Carlton asked.

"I never got that far. After I was drugged, I didn't go back," he explained.

Looking over his shoulder at the psychic, Carlton said, "I can understand wanting those people to get what's coming to them, but that's what the justice system is for, that's why we work for the SBPD. The Butcher's methods-"

"I know," Shawn said. "It's wrong and what I did was wrong."

Turning back to the bowl of strawberries, Carlton said, "Do you realize you're an accessory in this case now? You could get into a lot of trouble and I just don't know how I can help you."

"I know, I know!" Shawn snapped, crossing his arms and pacing the kitchen. "I screwed up, I could go to prison, but I want to make up for it now."

"What's this?" Carlton said, sounding intrigued.

Walking back over to Carlton and the fridge, Shawn asked curiously, "What's what?"

With the tips of his fingers, Carlton carefully turned the bowl of strawberries in place, showing a rather large strawberry with-

"What is that?" Carlton asked, looking closer at the strawberry.

"It looks like... a bite mark," Shawn said, almost in disbelief.

"A bite mark," Carlton repeated, completely floored.

A bite mark on the strawberry.

A bit mark that might just hold a trace of saliva.

The Butcher slipped up.

"Get a plastic bag. Second drawer on your right," Carlton said, standing up to go grab a toothpick.

Stabbing the toothpick into the strawberry, they very carefully placed the red fruit into the plastic Ziploc bag and sealed it up. Locking up the house behind them, the two climbed into Carlton's car and headed to the station. It was around eleven at night, so there wouldn't be too many people at the station.

"What are we going to tell people?" Shawn asked rubbing a hand against his forehead with a frown.

If they said that the Butcher left a message at Carlton's house, then that message would be evidence for the case and questions would inevitably arise about the message. Just what did it mean? Why did the Butcher choose Carlton's house? Eventually all those questions would lead back to Shawn's involvement which would mean big trouble for the psychic.

"We'll think a story to tell them later, let's just get this sample analyzed," Carlton said as he drove, and Shawn smiled. Carlton was willing to lie for him.

Frowning again, Shawn groaned, "Man, I'm getting the biggest headache."

"Stress can do that to you," Carlton commented. "Why don't you lie back and I'll tell you when we're there."

Putting the seat back, Shawn closed his eyes. The ride back to the station was silent, until-

"Call up Vincent Rayner to do the sample," Shawn mumbled, eyes still closed.

"Right," Carlton said as he pulled out his cell phone and located the man's name in his work phonebook. Because it was so late, there wouldn't be a lab tech working.

Pulling into the parking lot, Carlton looked over at the psychic and said, "We're here. You okay?"

"Yeah," he grumbled as he sat up with a hand to his head.

"I have Tylenol in my desk," Carlton said, grabbing the bagged strawberry and getting out of the car.

They walked into the station and in the time it took Shawn to have a couple Tylenol, Vincent Rayner had already arrived.

"Just what was so urgent, Detective Lassiter?" Vincent asked, curiously eyeing Shawn before looking back to Carlton.

"I need you to do a DNA test on the bite in this strawberry," Carlton said, holding up the bag. "We believe it may have the saliva of the Butcher."

Vincent's eyes widened at mention of the Butcher, and he hesitantly asked, "Shouldn't we get that FBI agent in here too? Or the Chief?"

"Not yet," Carlton said. "It could be nothing, but let's check first before we waste anyone's time."

Nodding, Vincent Rayner took the bag and went downstairs to the forensics lab to do the test. Carlton sat down in his chair with a sigh and Shawn took a seat on his desk.

"How's the headache?" he asked, looking up at the psychic.

"It's slowly fading," Shawn said. "Just how long do these tests take?"

"It can take a while," Carlton said. "But I'm sure Mr. Rayner understands how important this is."

Two hours passed with Rayner staying holed up in his lab. Carlton was slouched down in his chair at this point and Shawn had gone from sitting on the desk to laying on the desk. They had grabbed a radio from the employee's lounge and were listening to music to pass the time.

"Need more Tylenol?" Carlton asked tiredly, looking from the radio over to the psychic stretched out on his desk like a cat.

"No," Shawn said. "You'd think getting information like this would be a lot more exciting." Sitting up, he stared in the direction that lab technician had gone and said, "I'm going to go see what the hold-up is."

"Don't distract him."

"Yeah, yeah," Shawn said, sliding off the desk.

Heading down the stairs, he ended up in another hall and walked into the only room that had its lights on. Vincent Rayner had his back to him when he entered the forensics lab. The man appeared to be studying something on the computer screen.

"Any luck?" Shawn asked.

The lab technician spun around in his chair, a frightened look on his face, but before Shawn could even ask, everything went black...

* * *

Carlton waited a total of ten minutes before deciding to go down after Shawn. A simple '_no, the sample's not done yet_' wouldn't have taken that long, and if Vincent did have results, Shawn would have come back up to get him. 

Walking down the stairs, he entered the forensics lab. Oddly enough, the lights were off. The glow of the computer was the only thing lighting the room, and basking in the computer's glow was Vincent, slumped down in his chair with his throat slit.

His eyes immediately darted to the computer screen and the results it held, but before he could even react, an arm wrapped around him and a needle was stabbed into his neck. The effects of the drug were immediate. His body became too heavy and he couldn't stand. His eyes slid shut and the arm holding him let him carefully slump to the ground.

He knew no more...

* * *

I'll admit it, I panicked. Leaving that note for Shawn was a gutsy move and the results didn't go in my favor. Had I known Shawn would turn on me so quickly, I would have been more careful. Now I'm backed into a corner and I don't know what to do. 

They ruined it.

They ruined it all.

* * *

_(insert dramatic music here) I feel an evil grin coming on. Seriously though, this is horrible timing. I hate to do this to you guys, but tomorrow I head home for my week long vacation and at home there's no computer or internet connection. Also, I just got a call from IT that my laptop is irreparable (I'm typing on a campus library computer right now), so I don't know when the next update will be. Hopefully in two weeks. _

_So... any guesses on the Butcher? _

_Review please._


	9. Chapter Nine: Born Free

_Hey all! Well, here we are. The moment of truth. (nervous laugh) The chapter's shorter, but it's full of goodies. Um... read on!_

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own certain details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

* * *

**Chapter Nine: Born Free**

Carlton came to with a groan. Attempting to move his hand, he realized that he was tied to a chair. His eyes slowly slid open and as his vision came into focus, he saw that he had been seated in front of an empty table save for one lit candle. Said candle was the only light source in the room which made it hard to see where he was.

'_What happened?_' he wondered groggily, trying to think back.

He had gone to the station with Shawn to get _something_ checked out. Something important. A piece of evidence?

'_The strawberry_' he remembered blearily. There had been a bite in it... Possibly saliva, which meant a DNA sample from someone who could quite possibly be the Santa Barbara Butcher.

It was then that he remembered his discovery of the lab technician's body as well as Shawn's disappearance and that brief glimpse he got of the results on the computer screen before he blacked out.

'_But is can't be possible,_' he thought, completely baffled by what he had seen on the screen. '_There's got to be some sort of mistake._'

However, as the familiar figure stepped into the candle light, he knew the results didn't lie.

"I really wish you hadn't seen those results, Detective. It would've made things so much easier, and yet here we are."

"Shawn," Carlton said, aghast. "_You're_ the Santa Barbara Butcher?"

"You know, I really hate that name," Shawn said with a slight shake of his head. "But to answer your question, yes and no. If you count being an accessory, then three-fourths yes."

Carlton didn't understand. None of it made sense. If Shawn was the Butcher the whole time, then why did he provide Carlton with a DNA sample. Had the whole thing been a trap Shawn created to get Carlton alone so as to kill him? But even that didn't make sense. If Shawn wanted to kill him, he'd had plenty of opportunities beforehand. Carlton couldn't help but feel betrayed by the whole thing. Had their relationship been a trick too?

"How can someone be three-fourths guilty?" Carlton asked, furious.

"It's.. _complicated,_" Shawn said.

"Then explain it to me," Carlton hissed.

"I'm not Shawn," Shawn said simply.

Carlton blinked, his anger fading in exchange for complete confusion, "What?"

"I'm _not_ Shawn," he repeated.

Carlton sighed, annoyed with whatever game the psychic was playing, and asked, "Okay, I'll bite. Who the hell are you?"

"My name is Spence. You know me as the Santa Barbara Butcher, but I prefer Spence," Shawn, or rather, _Spence_ said.

"Evil twin?" Carlton asked with a mocking smile.

"Hardly," Spence deadpanned with a roll of his eyes. "No, I'm a part of Shawn."

"I don't understand," Carlton said, still confused.

"Allow me to explain," Spence said as he sat down in a chair placed on the other side of the table across from Carlton. "It all happened when Shawn was three. A man by the name of Leon LeBork had recently lost his wife due to a shootout between the police and some bank robbers. She had been a hostage caught in the crossfire. Because the robbers had been thrown in jail, he decided to blame the police, so he kidnapped the wives of several officers."

Carlton remembered hearing a little bit about this. It was far before his time as detective, but he'd been told some of the story by the older officers when he was first starting out at the SBPD.

"LeBork aimed to kidnap Henry Spencer's wife, but because she was away when this happened, little Shawn was taken in her place. LeBork felt it was just as fitting a punishment."

Spence paused and got a far off look in his eyes, then continued on, "He kept them all locked up in a basement for several days without food or water. The basement of this very house... Then one day, he just snapped. He came down into the basement with a chainsaw.."

* * *

_The snarl of the chainsaw mixed with the terrified screams. Blood sprayed everywhere and painted the walls. Hunks of flesh fell to the ground with a wet slap. _

_"Close your eyes, Shawn. Don't look!" came the tearful voice of one of the officer's wives. Mrs. Lornel, Shawn remembered. She had watched him on more than one occasion just like a couple other officer's wives. Mrs. Bently. Mrs. Morgan. Mrs. Brooks. Most of them were down here with him. _

_He tried to keep his eyes closed, but like any young boy, his curiosity won over. His eyes opened and revealed to him the massacre before him. _

_"No! Please, no!" Mrs. Lornel sobbed pleadingly as the man approached. _

_They were the last two left, and her screams died in her throat as the chainsaw came down..._

* * *

"Well, of course Shawn couldn't deal with something as traumatizing as that, so he created someone who could. Someone who was older and wouldn't be fazed by such brutal acts of violence. Thus I was born and became the blood-thirsty _Butcher_ you see today. After all, who better to deal with a killer than another killer? Don't you see? I can't help what I am. I was created this way."

"So you're an alter of Shawn's mind?" Carlton asked, trying to process the information he'd just been given.

"Correct," Spence confirmed with a false smile that looked so wrong on Shawn's face.

Carlton wasn't sure if he could believe the story. After all, Shawn was still trying to sell him the psychic bit, so how could he be sure that this wasn't just another lie? Sure, it would explain things in a complicated way that only Shawn could explain something, but it all just seemed too far-fetched. Still, he couldn't deny that the person standing before him was 100 percent different from the man he had fallen for over the past couple of weeks. No, they definitely weren't the same person, he could feel it deep down... So this must be true.

"A gay, homicidal psychic with multiple personality disorder. Boy, do I know how to pick them," Carlton muttered.

"Shawn's bi, actually," Spence said absentmindedly. "It is were up to me, he wouldn't date anyone at all."

"Does Henry know?" Carlton asked as he pulled at his bindings.

"Of course. Who do you think taught me how to evade the police so well?"

Carlton couldn't believe Henry was in on the whole thing. After having heard the story about how he arrested Shawn for taking his truck, it was a little hard to believe he would let something like this slide by. Of course, this whole night has been unbelievable, so why not add one more little fact like that to the bunch?

"So what happens now?" he asked warily, eyeing the homicidal alter's every move.

"What happens is really all up to you," Spence said seriously.

"What does that mean?" Carlton asked suspiciously.

"Well, you _could_ go and tell everyone the truth, or the more preferable option is that you forget the DNA results you saw tonight and pretend this little conversation we had never happened," Spence explained.

"Are you going to kill me if I tell?" Carlton asked with a defiant glare.

"No, I won't kill you," Spence said.

"Why not? You didn't seem to have a problem cutting that lab technician's throat," Carlton growled while silently wondering why he was trying to egg the psycho on.

"For your information, Detective, that man had been very, _very_ bad and was deserving of my knife. I won't bore you with the details, but know that he got off lucky in the end. Why else do you think I recommended him to do the sample? I like to save aside some of my playmates for occasions such as that," Spence explained.

"So that was you in the car, not Shawn?" Carlton asked, trying to keep up with the whole thing.

"For a brief moment, yes, it was me," Spence said. "But getting back to the matter at hand, you lead a very clean life and I don't kill the good people. I don't think Shawn would appreciate me doing something like that. Besides, I owe you, Detective. Remember?"

Carlton thought back to that night he spent at the hospital sitting by Shawn's bedside. It was a strange thought that for a few brief moments, he had been speaking directly to the very serial killer the entire department was hunting and didn't even know it. Now that he thought about it, it was also probably Spence that took a swing at him, not Shawn. Yet the fact that a deranged part of his boyfriend's mind turned out to be said serial killer was even stranger than the first thought.

"You just expect me to keep quiet about this?" Carlton asked incredulously.

"Detective, do you love Shawn?" Spence asked suddenly.

Carlton blinked, surprised by the question. Did he love Shawn? It was a little soon to know for sure and this new revelation about the psychic didn't help his decision any. It was true that as much as they had fought in the past, he did have some form of a crush on the younger man. He had to admit that Shawn was easy on the eyes and that every time they kissed, Carlton felt something. Was that love though, or was that just physical attraction.

"Too soon for love?" Spence asked, amused. "Do you at least care about him?"

Of course he cared about Shawn. For the past week or so, he had been worried over what had been bothering the psychic so much. He had also been extremely worried when Shawn had been drugged. Shawn was always so carefree that when Carlton saw him in such a delusional and vulnerable state, he felt a strong need to protect him; the same need he felt when Shawn had confessed to him all of the strange messages he had been receiving.

"I do care about him," he said firmly.

"Then we share a common interest because I care about Shawn's well-being too," Spence said. "Do you realize what would happen if word got out about this? Shawn's life would be over. If he's not carted off to jail, he'd be sent to a mental hospital. That's not even the worst part though. Shawn would be _devastated_ if he ever found out the truth. He wouldn't be able to live with himself knowing of his technical involvement in all the killings."

It was all true, Carlton knew, with lowered spirits. Shawn had felt guilty enough about all the messages and the four people he partially assisted with in finding evidence. Something like this would push him completely over the edge. It just didn't seem fair to make Shawn suffer with the news of something he had no control over.

Seeing that he'd gotten his point across, Spence smiled and said, "That's why I believe you'll keep quiet about this."

The red and blue lights of a police cruiser flashed outside a window Carlton hadn't noticed before because of the darkness. Spence's smile didn't falter any at the arrival of backup.

"I made an anonymous call before you woke up," he explained as he pulled a pair of handcuffs out of his pocket, Carlton's handcuffs. Snapping a cuff around on wrist, he put his arms behind the chair's back and handcuffed himself to it by weaving the cuffs into the back of the chair itself.

"Remember Shawn's well-being, Detective," Spence said. "Don't do anything rash without thinking about it first."

With that said, Spence closed his eyes and went limp, retreating back into Shawn's mind just as several police officers swarmed into the room with guns drawn. Juliet and Agent Vardez were among them.

"Carlton," she exclaimed as she rushed over to him, not putting her gun away. "Are you okay? What happened?"

"I'm fine," Carlton lied. He was anything but fine after all he had learned.

After a quick concerned look thrown in Shawn's direction, she went around behind him to untie his restraints.

"We found Rayner's body and then we couldn't get a hold of you. The secretary remembered seeing you both come in, but she never saw you leave," Juliet explained as she finished untying the restraints.

Carlton messaged his wrists with a slight grimace. Spence had tied it a bit too tight.

As half of the officers went off to check the house for the killer that would be there, Agent Vardez walked over to him and asked, "Just what happened, Detective Lassiter?"

"I don't remember much," Carlton lied again. "Spencer did his own checking up on the case, but I think we all expected that. He thought he may have found some evidence, a strawberry with some saliva on it maybe. I called up Rayner to check it out, mostly to humor Spencer, I seriously didn't think it would be anything. Spencer went down to the lab to check up on the results and when he didn't come back, I went down to check, but someone snuck up behind me and drugged me."

"Did you see who it was?" Juliet asked as she went over to check on Shawn who had yet to wake up.

He couldn't do it. He couldn't just turn Shawn in like that. It would destroy him and Carlton couldn't let that happen even though the whole thing went against everything he stood for.

"No," Carlton said. "I couldn't even tell if it was male or female. They stuck me with a needle and then I was out. I woke up here and then you all came in."

"It's all clear!" one of the officers declared as he and his comrades came back into the room. "There's nobody else in the house."

It was at this point that Shawn finally woke up, or at least Carlton hoped it was Shawn. How was he even supposed to know?

"What'd I miss?" Shawn asked, looking around the room in confusion.

"Oh, not much," Juliet said. "Just the Butcher giving you two the slip. Apparently that strawberry was just what the Butcher didn't want us to find. I don't remember seeing it in the lab though."

"Damn," Shawn muttered. "We were so close."

'_Too close,_' Carlton thought.

"Do you remember seeing anyone, Shawn?" Juliet asked, pulling out some keys and unlocking the handcuffs.

"No," Shawn said, shaking his head. "I remember seeing Rayner who looked freaked out, but then nothing after that."

"Rayner's dead, Shawn," Juliet sighed.

"He must have gotten a good look at the Butcher," Agent Vardez mused. "Which was why he was killed." Turning his attention back on all the officers, he shouted, "Alright, listen up people! There could be something here, some sort of evidence. Call up our CSI, I want this place searched from top to bottom. Officer McNab, I want you to do a search on this house, find out its history and see if there's a reason the Butcher chose this place."

"Yes sir."

"Detective Lassiter, you have the rest of the night off. Go get some sleep, you've been working since six this morning," Agent Vardez said. "And please escort Mr. Spencer off the premises."

Carlton got up without a word and walked Shawn out of the house. Juliet gave him her keys so that he could borrow her car for the night since he didn't have his own around, and a part of him wondered how Spence got them to the house in the first place.

He doubted the FBI agent was concerned about how much sleep he got. If anything, this was a subtle way of punishing him for not calling the agent when he had the possible evidence in his possession. At the moment though, he couldn't care less about the FBI agent _or_ working on the case. He had a bigger problem to deal with and that problem was walking next to him, completely oblivious.

'_What the hell can I even do at this point?_' he wondered, feeling more trapped than he ever felt in his entire life.

_"Don't do anything rash without thinking about it first."_

He doubted he would be getting any sleep anytime soon.

* * *

_That's the end of chapter 9. I have a feeling that some of you aren't going to be too happy with the way this turned out, but hey, what can you do? This is how I planned it from the very beginning. And to Dexter fans, I just couldn't resist using 'Born Free' for the chapter title. _

_Review please!_


	10. Chapter Ten: Turmoil

_Hello everyone! Here's chapter 10 for you all. Can't think of anything to say, so enjoy!_

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own certain details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

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* * *

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**Chapter Ten: Turmoil**

After leaving the house the other night, Carlton had insisted that Shawn stay at his place until things cooled down. He had used the excuse that because they had both been targeted by the Butcher, it would be best if they stayed together. Power in numbers and all of that. Truthfully though, he wanted to keep Shawn close so that he could keep an eye on him. In retrospect, that may not have been the wises choice because keeping Shawn close meant keeping the Butcher close, but Shawn had been so happy with the arrangement and Carlton wanted to keep Shawn as happy as he could.

Neither of them got much sleep that night. Shawn was worried about the Butcher coming back for them, and Carlton was worried that Spence would change his mind about letting him live. They had both been tense and on edge for most of the night.

When morning finally came, Carlton left for work early after downing a few cups of coffee. He got into the station and sat down at his desk, but for the life of him, he just couldn't concentrate on the files in front of him. What was the point? He already knew who the Butcher was and he couldn't do anything about it.

Sighing, he still flipped through the papers as if he still cared about being involved in the case. Many of the papers was a report on what had been done last night to find evidence on the Butcher. No solid evidence had actually been found though because Spence was just too good at what he did. Nothing came up on surveillance and any fingerprints they dusted for would just turn up Shawn's prints.

As for McNab's report on the house, he couldn't find anything on it, not even old reports of the massacre that occurred there. Carlton had a feeling that Spence was responsible for the missing paperwork, but he couldn't be completely sure.

Shoving the papers back into the folder, he slid the folder into the bottom drawer of his desk. It was no use. He couldn't concentrate, not with this horrible secret hanging over his head. There was no way he could pretend that everything was perfectly normal. He'd have an ulcer by the end of the week if he just ignored what he knew.

He needed to talk to someone about it, and Henry was the only other person that knew of Spence's existence. Taking an early lunch break, he mindlessly drove to the older man's house and it wasn't until he was knocking on Henry's front door that he wondered just what the hell he was going to say to him.

"Carlton, to what do I owe the pleasure?" Henry asked, standing in the front door.

"We need to talk. Can I come in?" Carlton asked.

"Sure," Henry said, stepping to the side and allowing Carlton to come in. Closing the door behind him, he asked, "What do you need to talk about?"

"It's about Shawn," he said, not really caring that he uncharacteristically used Shawn's first name rather than his last in from of the psychic's father.

Sighing, Henry asked, "What did he do now?"

"It's not so much about what _he_ did," Carlton said before deciding to just come out and say it. "Henry, I _know._ I know all about Shawn's little 'alter' problem. Last night, Spence made an appearance and made everything quite clear to me."

Henry paled considerably before shaking his head and growling, "Dammit." Looking like he aged ten years, Henry wearily walked into the living room and slumped down onto the couch with a sigh. "That kid just doesn't listen to me anymore." Looking up at Carlton who had followed him into the living room, he asked, "Why are you telling me this?"

"I just don't know what to do," Carlton explained, taking a seat in a chair close to the couch. "I don't want to send him away to some nut house, but I can't just sit back and do _nothing._"

For a moment, Henry looking like he was going to ask why Carlton even cared this much, but then decided against it and said in an old, defeated tone, "There's nothing that we can do, Detective."

"There's got to be _something,_" Carlton said, not about to just give up. "Some sort of medicine maybe? Some solution that hasn't been thought of?"

"Believe me, I've tried every possible solution that doesn't involve telling Shawn, but there's no easy way to fix this," Henry said. "The only way we'd even have a chance at fixing this is through years of therapy; something that involves telling Shawn the truth."

They sat in silence for a moment, each lost in their own thoughts. Carlton knew that Henry had more experience with the situation, but he refused to believe that there was nothing that could be done to remedy the problem.

"Does anyone else know?" Henry finally asked.

"No, I was the only one Spence talked to as far as I know," Carlton said. "Does anyone else know besides you?"

"No, I made sure it all stayed a secret," Henry said. "His mother didn't even know, though she suspected that something was off."

"Last night during out little conversation, Spence said that you..." Carlton trailed off, not knowing if by asking the question that had been bugging him all throughout the night, he'd be stepping over the line. "Why did you do it? Why didn't you get him help in the beginning?"

"You have to understand that I tried," Henry said. "We brought him to therapy in the beginning, before I even knew of Shawn's other self, but Shawn just didn't respond to it. He had completely blanked the whole event from his mind. I know that's not healthy, and the therapist told me it wasn't healthy, but Shawn was back to his normal self, so I accepted it as luck."

"It wasn't until later that I noticed the changes in Shawn's personality. He memory of things had been split and his sense of time was skewed. When I found the mini animal graveyard, I knew, and I confronted him on it. He.. _Spence_ that is, didn't deny it at all. He hadn't even been completely aware that he was an alter, but he was very accepting of it. I thought that if I trained him, I could control him. I had already almost lost Shawn once, I didn't want to lose him again. Not to some mental facility or prison, but then Spence broke free from his leash..."

It seemed ridiculous to Carlton that Henry believed he could 'train' something like Spence. He understood an officer's need to stop all the horrible criminals there are in the world, but he couldn't see eye-to-eye with Henry's method. To train a beast in vengeance was just wrong.

He hid it well, but Henry was a broken man and now that the beast he trained had broken free from his mental barriers, he wasn't going to do a thing to fix the situation. Carlton knew that Henry wanted to protect his son, his _real_ son, but the detective had lost a little respect for the older man.

Henry may be able to sit back and do nothing, but Carlton couldn't. He was going to find a solution.

First though, he needed to do a little research.

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* * *

.

When Carlton got back to the station, he booted up the computer on his desk and searched the internet to learn all he could about multiple personality disorder, or rather, dissociative identity disorder.

'_'They may have as many as 100 alters or as few as two, though the average is 10 distinct ones..'_'

He only knew of Spence, but the thought that there could be more was... frightening. Carlton quickly assured himself that Henry would have told him if there was another alter aside from Spence. Then again, what if Henry didn't even know?

'_'Transitions between alters are usually sudden and caused by stress.'_'

So there was possibly a trigger of some sort that brought Spence on, but what could it be? As far as Carlton could tell, there didn't seem to be any sort of consistent condition whenever Spence was around. Of course, he hadn't known of the situation long enough to keep an eye out for something like that. It seemed more likely though that Spence grew out of needing a trigger.

He read through the different symptoms and each one made him mentally cringe. The patient can often become depressed or suicidal. Self-mutilation is common. Some patients experience visual or auditory hallucinations.

Shawn probably wasn't hallucinating, otherwise he would know something was up, but what about the other symptoms? In the time that they've been dating, he didn't seem depressed and Carlton never saw any scars or injuries that could point to self mutilation. However, Shawn still had many people at the station believing he was psychic, so he'd probably be a good enough actor to cover something like that up.

As for treatments, there _were_ medications he could try, but every website pretty much said the same thing: If Shawn was to ever fully recover from his.. disease, he'd have to undergo extensive psychotherapy, some sites even suggested hypnosis. An average of three to five years was seen as the minimum length for treatment. For something like this, Shawn would obviously have to know the truth, and that was something Carlton wanted to avoid.

'_'The goal is to deconstruct the different personalities and unite them into one.'_'

Something like that made sense, but the idea of merging a homicidal maniac like Spence with Shawn was... unsettling. The idea was to protect Shawn and who he was from this whole Butcher case, so how could combining homicidal tendencies with his true personality be helpful at all?

Mentally growling in frustration, he closed the browser window and shut his computer down. A quick look at his watch told him it was almost time to head home anyway. He might as well get his things together.

After a long day of research and investigating, Carlton felt like he didn't have a single helpful solution. The only solution that was apparent to him, and it wasn't even really a solution, was to try some of those medications. He knew some people he could call to get them without leaving a paper trail; people from his past, before he even thought of joining the Police Academy, who he would have been happy to never talk to again.

'_The things you do for the people you care about,_' he thought with a sigh as he headed out to his car.

It would all be worth it though if the medication could subdue the monster that was Spence.

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* * *

.

Shawn had take-out ready for the both of them when he got home. As Carlton hung up his jacket and took his shoes off by the door, he looked into the kitchen and watched as Shawn got out two plates and glasses. He stared intently at the psychic while trying to look like he wasn't staring, and wondered if this was really Shawn or if it was Spence playing a trick on him.

"How was your day?" Shawn asked, handing an empty plate to Carlton with a small smile, a smile that could only belong to Shawn and was nothing like Spence's fake smiles that looked more like a triumphant smirk.

"Tiring," Carlton said, relaxing a bit as he took the plate and piled on food from the different take-out containers. He never did actually have lunch and he was feeling pretty hungry at this point.

"Was there any new evidence found on the Butcher?" Shawn asked, putting food on his own plate.

"No, nothing new," he said. "The Butcher's too good, he hasn't slipped up yet."

"Well, he's gotta slip up eventually," Shawn said. "Everyone does at some point... Except for the Zodiac killer and Jack the Ripper and, well, you know what I mean. Anyway, there's no way he'll be like another one of those unsolved murder mysteries, his name isn't _nearly_ cool enough."

'_But if he slips up, he'll go down and so will you,_' Carlton thought for a moment before shaking the thought away. "I guess... So how was your day?"

"It was okay," Shawn said with a shrug. "I wanted to see if I could get any vibes off that house the Butcher brought us to, but Gus is still so completely against us having any part in this case. I spent the day working on boring minor cases instead."

"I take it you haven't told him about your previous involvement in the Butcher case," Carlton said.

"No way, Gus would pop a blood vessel and we just had the carpet at Psych cleaned," Shawn said. "That reminds me, I should probably destroy the rest of the things the Butcher gave me, like that CD." he paused for a moment and glanced over at Carlton, as if waiting for some sort of reaction.

"What?" Carlton asked.

"You're not going to lecture me on how that evidence could be beneficial to the Butcher case and that I should turn it in to the station so that you guys will have a better chance at catching the Butcher?" he asked with a quirked eyebrow.

"Nope, you should destroy it. If you brought it in, they'd ask why you had it and whatever conclusion they come to would not end well for you," Carlton explained.

"Oh, okay," Shawn said slowly. "That's very out of character for you."

"Is it wrong for me to want what's best for you more than I want what's best for the case?" Carlton asked as he poured them both a drink.

"No," Shawn said, smiling. "It's nice actually."

They ate their meal in the living room with the TV turned to a random channel playing a show neither of them really cared for. It was more for background noise than anything. After they finished eating, they abandoned their plates on the coffee table and flipped through the different channels to see if something more interesting was on. Normally Carlton would have done the dishes after eating, but after such a long day, he wasn't that motivated and felt they could wait till later.

As Carlton flipped through the different TV channels with the remote held lazily in his hand, Shawn leaned over and kissed him on the neck. Abandoning the remote on the couch, he turned to the psychic and, with one hand behind his neck, kissed Shawn back. Lounging on the couch, they basked in each others company, deepening the kiss. Shawn's hand trailed under his shirt, sliding up his chest, and he broke away to move back to kissing Carlton's neck.

It wasn't that Carlton didn't enjoy this sudden display of affection, but his logical mind wouldn't be silenced by a kiss and wondered what brought it on. He pulled away from Shawn, taking in the dark bags under the psychic's eyes and the weary appearance that he himself probably sported too.

"It's late," he explained, seeing Shawn's confused look. "Neither of us got any sleep last night, so we should probably go to bed."

"Oh, come on!" Shawn said, exasperated. "We haven't done anything like this in _so long_, I'm going through withdrawals. And what about last night? Whoever said people are passionately romantic after near-death experiences is a liar, liar, pants-on-fire."

With that said, he pounced forward and locked lips with the detective. Carlton could hardly argue with that logic and kissed back. It was a rough kiss at first, as if they were both frustrated with the other, but then it became softer and more intimate. Shawn's hands undid Carlton's tie, throwing it in a random direction, before moving on to fiddle with the buttons on his shirt.

Simultaneously standing up, they blindly moved toward the bedroom. Neither parted lips as they stumbled through the house, bumping into furniture and walls along the way. By the time they reached the bedroom, both were missing their shirts and Carlton was busy working on Shawn's belt when the psychic's legs hit the bed and they both went tumbling over onto the mattress.

Neither were fazed in the least. Straddling the psychic, Carlton worked on removing that pesky belt while Shawn wrapped his arms around him and trailed kisses from his mouth down to his neck. Finally the belt was gone and tossed carelessly across the room.

Leaning up slightly, Shawn whispered into his ear, "I hope you know that I _will_ kill you if I absolutely have to."

Pulling back slightly, he asked breathlessly, "What?"

Blinking, Shawn stared up at him, confused, "I didn't say anything."

Shawn pulled him back down for another kiss and for a moment, Carlton's mind was too distracted to give Shawn his full attention. Had he imagined it? Was it just the stress of everything getting to him.

Apparently noticing that Carlton wasn't as into it as he was, Shawn kissed him more furiously and put more effort into his actions in an attempt to draw the detective's attention back to him. Carlton forced his mind to accept the comment as a fluke and kissed back just as furiously. His hands ran down Shawn's chest before coming to rest on the psychic's pants that were in his way. However, as soon as his fingers undid the zipper, Shawn suddenly pulled back from him and pushed the detective off and away from him to the far side of the bed.

"What the _hell?_" Shawn hissed, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

"What?" Carlton asked incredulously. "Did I somehow read the signals wrong in between the _making-out?_"

"Apparently so!" Shawn snapped. "Was that not warning enough for you? If 'I will kill you' isn't clear enough, maybe I should just stab you next time."

"Spence," Carlton said with a tired sigh.

"Yeah, who else would it be, Casanova?" Spence said, throwing Carlton a dirty look before climbing off the bed and searching for his belt.

"Am I not allowed to make-out with my boyfriend?" Carlton asked, sending a glare right back at the psycho.

"Like I said, if it were up to me, Shawn wouldn't date _anyone,_" Spence said.

"That's just the thing, Spence, it's _not_ up to you," Carlton argued. "This is Shawn's body, do you understand? And Shawn can do whatever he damn well pleases with it."

"You seem to be forgetting that I have the most control in this situation," Spence said as he looped the belt back through his pants. "We wouldn't want Shawn waking up in the middle of a murder scene with blood on his hands, now would we?"

"You wouldn't do that," Carlton hissed. "You want to keep him protected too."

"Do you really want to take that risk?"

Carlton fell silent because, no, he couldn't take that risk. Spence was too unstable and unpredictable. Carlton wouldn't put it past the psycho to pull something like that.

Seeing that he won the battle, Spence smiled that fake smile of his and left the bedroom.

"Where are you going?" Carlton called after him.

"I'm going out for the night," he called back a bit smugly. "Don't wait up."

"Just what should I tell Shawn tomorrow when he wakes up?" Carlton asked.

"Easy, tell him he fell asleep right in the middle of it all," Spence said simply. "I'll even help you out and put him back in bed when I come back."

The door slammed shut and he was gone. Sighing, Carlton took a quick cold shower before collecting up his discarded clothes off the floor and tossing them in a laundry basket. After that, he cleaned up the kitchen and did the dishes before finally deciding to go to bed. He slept restlessly and dreamt that he was surrounded by a hundred Shawns and he couldn't tell which one was the real one.

He was torn from his sleep several hours later by a subtle movement to his left. Opening his eyes, he saw Shawn laying on the bed next to him, fast asleep. In the faint dawn light, he could make out a small spot of blood on the psychic's cheek. Carlton reached over and gently wiped the still-wet blood off with his thumb, hoping that there weren't any other spots Spence failed to clean up, and wiped the blood off his thumb on the inside of his pillow case with the intention of washing it later on.

'_I don't know if I can do this..._'

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* * *

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Several days had passed since that night and Carlton didn't make anymore overly affectionate make-out attempts that would invoke the wrath of Spence. Unfortunately, Shawn noticed the slight distance Carlton put between them and Carlton had no solid explanation to offer the psychic. To make up for the decrease in physical affection, Carlton took Shawn out more, to dinner or a movie or whatever they decided to do.

Since that night, there had also been two more murders. At this point, Carlton didn't even care what the people did, though he supposed it had to do with the Rattlesnake Tavern list that the task force was still looking into. Every day that he went into work and pretended to care about the case, he wondered if it would just be easier to ask to be moved to another case. He didn't want to risk suspicion though, so he just stuck with it.

Carlton had also received a few bottles of the medication he requested from one of his old contacts. Thankfully the person had been an old friend, so he didn't have to worry too much about having to pay the man back more than just the money he gave him. Carlton was also very thankful he was a good cook and could mask the taste of the medication, if there even was a taste, in whatever meal he made Shawn.

There were side-effects of course, which was why Shawn was currently camped out on the living room couch with a blanket, a pillow, and just about every other thing a sick person might need. As Carlton got ready for work that morning, in the background he could faintly hear Shawn talking on the phone to Gus.

"No, I can't come in today either, I'm still sick," Shawn said, sounding drained and half-dead. "I'm not lying, I really am sick and I'm hurt that after all these years you can't sense when your best friend is on his death bed."

There was a pause.

"I'm not exaggerating, I really feel that horrible" Shawn insisted.

Another pause.

"Umm, I'm always tired and completely drained. I've been getting migraines, I haven't really had a big appetite... Don't worry, I'm eating, I'm just not enjoying it. And, uh, at times I've been having a little trouble _concentrating_, if you know what I mean, so it wouldn't really be beneficial for me to even come in," Shawn said.

Yet another pause.

"No, I'm not taking anything," Shawn said with a tired sigh. "Yes, Gus, I'm sure. I would know if I was taking something. The point is that I can't come in and I'm tired right now so I'm gonna hang up."

Shawn flipped his cellphone shut before Gus could get out another word and set the small device on the coffee table that had been pulled up close to the couch. Snuggling deeper into his blanket cocoon, Shawn wearily lifted the remote and flipped to a channel dedicated to children's cartoons. He turned the volume down low before setting the remote on the coffee table next to the cell phone.

Straightening his tie and grabbing his briefcase, Carlton walked over to the edge of the couch and said, "Alright, I'm heading out. I'll be back around noon to make you lunch."

"Uh-huh.."

"Call me if you need anything," he said, staring at the psychic with a spark of concern in his eyes.

"Uh-huh.."

Frowning, Carlton left the house, being sure to lock the front door behind him, and went off to work. The days continued like that for well over a week with Shawn suffering the drug's side-effects and Carlton fighting back guilt because of this. Over and over he had to tell himself that this was for Shawn's own good, that it was the only solution he could come up with, and at least Shawn was getting enough sleep now because of the drowsiness.

It was a little over two weeks later when things started to look up. Along with there being no more new murders, Carlton hadn't had another encounter with Spence since he had started Shawn on the medication. Could it be possible that it was working? Maybe, by keeping Shawn on a regular dosage, he could get rid of Spence for good.

As he entered his house after another long, rather pointless day of working on the Butcher case, the smell of food hit his nose. Smiling, he hung his jacket up and kicked off his shoes before moving into the kitchen. For once, Shawn wasn't in his usual spot on the couch. Instead, he was in the kitchen and he was actually cooking.

"It's good to see you up and about," Carlton said as he leaned against the kitchen counter and watched Shawn cook.

Shawn glanced over his shoulder briefly before turning his attention back to meal he was preparing and said, "Yeah, I'm really starting to feel much better. I'm thinking I might go into Psych tomorrow. I'm not gonna call Gus and get his hopes up until morning though."

Carlton nodded before asking, "Do you need any help with the food?"

"No, it's only stuffed shells and I wanted to do the cooking for you for once," Shawn said as he stirred the extra sauce he had left over before checking on the stuffed shells in the oven. "It's one of the few things I know how to make. You can set the kitchen table though, I've spent enough time in the living room as it is."

So while Shawn hovered over the food, making sure nothing burned, Carlton got to work at setting the small table in the kitchen.

"What do you want to drink?" Carlton asked as he moved over to the fridge.

"Anything's fine," Shawn said with a simple shrug.

Carlton poured them both a glass of milk just as Shawn dished out the stuffed shells onto both their plates. Grabbing the extra sauce, Shawn set it in the center of the table in case either of them needed extra before taking a seat at the table. Putting the milk away, Carlton sat down himself and dug in to the rather tasty looking meal.

"How is it?" Shawn asked.

Carlton mentally grimaced. Shawn put a bit _too_ much spices in the mix for the shells, but that was nothing more sauce couldn't fix. Taking a sip of milk, he poured more sauce over the shells and said, "It's really good."

"Great!" Shawn said as he looked down at his own plate and worked on cutting the shells into halves. "So how was your day? Any news on the Butcher?"

"No," Carlton said between bites. "In fact, he hasn't killed anyone for almost two weeks now."

"That's strange," Shawn said, frowning. "Maybe he decided to call it quits and left while he still could."

"Maybe," Carlton said with a shrug.

"You know, I think I'm going to have water," Shawn said, standing up from the table. "My stomach's starting to act up again."

Carlton frowned as he watched Shawn fill up a glass of water; the guilt once again rose up, but he quickly squashed it down. It was all for Shawn's own good and the side effects were going down. He shouldn't feel guilty for helping the psychic.

For the rest of dinner, they exchanged small talk. Afterwards, Carlton insisted that he clean the kitchen up since Shawn made the meal and Shawn just shrugged in agreement before moving into the living room to watch some TV.

Carlton was in the middle of scrubbing a dish off with a soapy sponge when his stomach suddenly twisted in pain. At first he thought it was that acidic feeling he sometimes got after eating Italian or Mexican food, but as the pain grew and his hands began to shake, he somehow didn't think that was the case.

The dish slipped out of his hands and shattered on the ground. In the living room he could hear the TV go on mute. Ignoring the broken plate, he wiped his hands off on a dish towel before stumbling out of the kitchen on legs that had become shaky and weak. In the living room now, he stumbled backwards until his back hit the wall and he slid to the ground.

"Problems, Detective?" came a smug inquiry.

"W-what's going on," Carlton asked, his breathing reduced to short, pained gasps.

Walking around the couch, Shawn came to stand before him. No, not Shawn, but Spence because only Spence could have such a vile, cold-hearted look on his face. Spence stood there, staring down at him for a moment, before finally holding up a few medication bottles, a few _empty_ medication bottles.

"Did you really think I wouldn't notice all the side effects along with the fact that I was 'sick' for over two weeks?" Spence said, tossing the empty containers onto the ground by Carlton. "And did you really think that simple medication would get rid of me? Sorry to tell you this, but dear old Dad tried that a while back. When Shawn decided to sneak off to Psych this morning after you went to work, I saw it as the perfect opportunity to get back at you for trying to poison me."

Carlton curled up on the ground as the pain in his body spread and spots danced in his vision.

"Maybe next time you'll be more careful about what you eat when there's a killer living in your house. I put the medicine in the milk, the mix for your stuffed shells, and the extra sauce that you might have noticed I didn't help myself to. It only seemed fair after you did the same to my food for the past couple weeks."

Kneeling down before him, Spence set the cordless phone down on the ground next to Carlton and said, "I'll tell you what I've told my dad time and time again: There's no easy way to get rid of me, do you understand? I'm a part of Shawn, and I'll always be here." Standing up, he said carelessly, "You should probably dial 911 now. Wouldn't want you to die of overdose, now would we?"

Picking up the phone with shaking hands, Carlton dialed the three numbers that would get him help. Off in the distance, he could faintly hear the front door opening and closing as Spence left.

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* * *

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When Carlton came to, he found that he was laying in a hospital bed with a nurse checking his vitals.

"Oh, I'll go get your doctor," she said when she saw that he was awake, then scurried away.

Carlton closed his eyes and heaved a sigh, trying to come up with a back story as to why he overdosed on prescription medicine.

"Mr. Lassiter," someone said.

Carlton opened his eyes and looker over at a man in hospital scrubs who was probably his doctor.

"Hello, I'm Dr. Dwayne. You were brought in here last night due to severe drug overdose," Dr. Dwayne said, explaining what he already knew. "You had to have your stomach pumped and we hooked you up on a series of IV fluids. Could you explain to me what happened that night?"

The doctor clearly thought he was suicidal.

Sighing again, Carlton looked the doctor straight in the eyes and said, "A while back, one of my cousins visited along with her son who has several mental problems. He must have mixed some of his medication in with my food before they left. That's the only explanation I can think of because I didn't take anything last night, not even aspirin."

The doctor nodded, apparently satisfied with his answer, and said, "Yes, that matches up with the chemicals we pumped out of you. However, I would like to keep you here for a couple more hours of observation. After that, you're free to go, and I'd suggest you throw away the rest of the food in your house so that this doesn't happen again."

"Sure thing, Dr. Dwayne. Just tell me when I can go," Carlton said, relaxing back into the hospital bed.

"Do you feel up for visitors?" Dr. Dwayne asked.

Carlton's back stiffen slightly because he knew that one of those visitors was probably Shawn. He knew it wasn't Shawn's fault, that Shawn had no control over any of this, but his body was still worn out from the overdose and he didn't want to see the psychic just yet.

"Actually, I'm feeling a little tired. I'd rather get a little shut-eye in before I can go," Carlton said.

The doctor nodded and left, probably to go tell whoever was waiting to see him the news.

Things couldn't continue on like this, he knew. He couldn't sit back and ignore it all, but he also couldn't just hope that simple medication would solve things. Spence was right, there was no easy way of getting rid of him. There were ways, just... difficult ways. Henry wasn't going to do anything, and Carlton was the only other one that knew of the situation.

He needed to put a stop to this.

He was at a crossroads and he needed to make a choice. He could either turn back, like Henry did so many years ago, or he could choose a path and accept the unfortunate consequences for what they were because neither path had a pleasant outcome...

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_Wooh! Finally done with this chapter. Not a really happy one though.. Meh, what can you do? This isn't a happy situation. Hope you're all enjoying the story. The info I got on multiple personality disorder is just random stuff I googled. Using medication rather than therapy is not recommended and probably frowned upon, but Carlton felt it was his only option. ALSO, any errors in this can be blamed on fanfiction for logging me off just as I was about to save all the hard work I spent editing this thing. (goes on an f-bomb, cursing rampage)  
_

_Review please!_


	11. Chapter Eleven: Forever Unsolved

_Hello everyone. I'm gonna try and wrap everything up in this last chapter, so read on and enjoy._

Lawyers: Our client does not own Psych, nor does she own specific details belonging to Dexter. Don't sue her.

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**Chapter Eleven: Forever Unsolved**

Shawn had woken up in Psych at an odd time at night when he received the call from Juliet that Carlton was in the hospital. He had been a bit surprised by how much time had passed while he slept, only really planning on taking a short nap, but he shrugged it off as left-over fatigue from his cold and headed over to the hospital to see Carlton. He was thankfully okay, but he wasn't accepting visitors and the story the doctor fed him and Juliet, who had also come to check on him, seemed a little fishy. As far as Shawn knew, Carlton hadn't had any relatives come visit him. Things just didn't add up considering that they'd gotten groceries several times in the time that they'd been dating and living together.

Carlton was hiding something, but for the life of him, Shawn just couldn't figure out what that might be. Juliet had gone back to work, reassured that her partner was okay, and Shawn hung out in the hospital until Carlton was released. Shawn drove them both back to the detective's home around noon, and during the unexplainably uncomfortable ride, he tried to figure out what really happened. Carlton kept giving him the same story the doctor told him though and he was remaining strangely tight-lipped about any other detail.

When they got back to the detective's house, Carlton went straight to the kitchen and threw away pretty much all the food they had and dumped the drinks into sink after finishing up the remaining dishes. After telling Shawn that he'd get more food later, he left for work for the remainder of the day with the excuse that he had to catch up on paperwork, leaving Shawn standing in an empty house feeling as if he had missed an important episode of one of his favorite TV shows.

At the time, Shawn had hoped that Carlton was just feeling grumpy after eating some bad food, but as the days passed on, the detective remained just as cold and distant as he had been after being released from the hospital. Not only that, but his attitude was also a bit condescending, as if Shawn was an oblivious child. He was trying to be subtle about it all, Shawn could tell, but it was easy enough for the psychic to pick up on.

Shawn sat lazily on top of the desk in the main office of Psych while Gus moved around their small agency making sure everything was locked up and shut down. Because they had no clients and Gus had specific pharmaceutical work he needed to take care of, they were closing down for the day. Usually Shawn would argue that he would be fine keeping the place open for the full day on his own, but he just didn't have the energy for it. Carlton's bad mood was effecting him too.

Watching Gus pull on his jacket, Shawn wished he could talk to his friend about his relationship troubles and get some extra insight from a third party, but at the start of his and Carlton's dating experiments, they had both decided to keep the whole thing a secret. Somehow Shawn didn't think that he could spring the whole thing on his best friend now and then expect good relationship advice in return.

"You coming?" Gus asked, pausing halfway to the front door.

"You go ahead," Shawn said, waving Gus away. "I just need to get a few things taken care of before I go."

"Okay, just don't forget to lock the front door," Gus said, repeating what he always told the psychic before he left for the day.

"Yeah, yeah," Shawn said, rolling his eyes.

As soon as he was sure that he friend was gone, Shawn slid off of the desk and headed over to the filing cabinet. Pulling open one of the drawers, Shawn went straight to the 'B' section where he had hidden the CD. It was the only memento he had left of the Butcher. He had already destroyed almost every other clue the killer left behind for him in his apartment. The only thing he kept was the list of buyers. The people sold needed to be saved and he wasn't selfish enough to destroy the only thing that could aid in their rescue.

'_I can't wait until this is all over with,_' Shawn thought as he stared at the seemingly innocent CD before snapping it in half and then snapping it into fourths.

Usually a difficult case would thrill him, but this case had gotten too personal and had gone on for far too long. He had never had this much trouble solving something before. It almost seemed insulting, as if the Butcher was really just mocking him with all the clues, the threat, and the brief kidnapping.

The kidnapping..

There had to be clues at that house, clues that the police missed. He could interview the people in the surrounding buildings too because someone had to have seen or heard something. Gus didn't want him going back there, but what Gus didn't know couldn't hurt him. Besides, there was really no harm in checking, was there? He'd be quick about it and nobody would be the wiser.

Hopping on his bike, he headed to the old house he and Carlton had been taken to.

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* * *

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The whole thing had been a dead end. The house had been completely locked up and the kidnapping had taken place late into the night, so none of the neighbors had seen anything. He couldn't say that he was too disappointed. After all, it had been a long shot and Carlton did previously tell him that there hadn't been any evidence found. Parking his bike in the empty driveway of Carlton's house, he trudged up to the front door and let himself in with the key the detective had given him several weeks back.

"He must still be at work," he said out loud as he dropped his coat on the floor by the front door and headed into the kitchen to grab a snack. He wouldn't even bother making dinner because Carlton always came home with takeout on the days he worked late and when he wasn't working, he would insist on cooking for Shawn.

Opening the fridge, he gaze was immediately drawn to the pineapple and the note that was pinned to it. For a moment, his heart stopped, but then he read the message.

_Shawn,  
Meet me at Psych.  
(heart) Carlton_

Smiling, Shawn pulled off the small note and took the pineapple with him as he left the house for Psych. Just as Carlton had given him a house key a few weeks back, he had given the detective a key to Psych since that had become more of a second home to him than his actual apartment was, so it wasn't surprising when he parked in front of Psych and saw the lights on. He couldn't see Carlton's car, but then again, there wasn't exactly a plethora of parking spaces on the street.

Pulling off his helmet and grabbing the pineapple from the compartment in the back, Shawn headed into the small psychic detective agency. Setting his helmet on a small stand by the front door, a pleasantly surprised smile spread across his face as he took in the scene before him. What had once been a small waiting room was now a romantic dinner setting. In the center of the room was a small round table equipped with table cloth, candle, silverware, plates full of delicious food that looked as if they just came out of the oven, glasses and two chairs positioned on either side of the table.

"Carlton?" he called out, not seeing the detective.

Exiting Psych's main office with a bottle of wine in hand, Carlton smiled at Shawn and said, "Hey, Shawn."

"Not that I don't love this random romantic gesture, but you could've picked a better way to inform me than a fruit message. I nearly had a heart attack thinking it was you-know-who," Shawn said with a good-naturedly smile showing that he wasn't mad.

"Let's not talk about him tonight," Carlton said as he walked over to the table and set down the bottle of wine. "We've both been so stressed and distracted by that whole case that we haven't really had any time for ourselves to be together like this."

"I would love nothing more than to spend tonight with you," Shawn said as he walked over to the detective and wrapped his arms around his lower back. "I brought pineapple for dessert."

Reaching over to the table with one arm, he set the pineapple down next to the wine before turning back to Carlton and pulling him in for a kiss.

Pulling away after a moment, Shawn said, "The food looks great."

"I didn't have time to cook today, so I stopped by a restaurant before I came here," Carlton admitted a bit sheepishly.

"That's fine," Shawn said with a shrug. "It still looks great and you were the one to set this all up, Mr. Romantic."

"I just wanted to apologize," Carlton sighed. "I haven't been treating you as well as I should be."

"Don't worry about it. Tonight, this all makes up for it," Shawn said, gesturing at the candle-lit dinner. "Now let's eat before the food gets cold."

The two pulled away and as Shawn took his seat, Carlton pulled down the shades to the front window to block out any prying eyes. After pouring them both a glass of wine, Carlton took a seat across from Shawn and the two began eating. Neither wanted to spoil the moment with small talk about work because most of the work they did involved the bane of their existence, the Santa Barbara Butcher. Instead, they talked about happier events in their lives.

"The first time I met Gus, I was throwing something at him in the middle of his picture-day picture," Shawn said, laughing a bit as he finished off the last few bites of his meal.

"Why would you do that?" Carlton asked, amused.

"I just thought it would be funny for his picture to be of him smiling and completely unaware of the object flying towards his head," Shawn explained. "He got me back for the same thing though, so it was cool. We sort of made it a tradition for a couple years and.."

He trailed off, suddenly feeling very tired.

"Shawn?"

"We've been best... best friends," setting his fork down, he shook his head slightly to clear away the quickly growing fog consuming his mind. "Since then..."

"Shawn? ...okay?"

"Huh?" Lifting his heavy head, he stared at the detective through half-lidded eyes, wanting to assure him, "Just feeling drowsy." His gaze drifted down to his empty plate and he blinked rapidly in an attempt to wake himself up. "Did I have turkey?"

Carlton said nothing.

"Tryptophan?" Shawn wondered out loud, slumping down in his seat. "...No."

He couldn't fight the claws of sleep any longer. Closing his eyes, he drifted off and let the shadows rise up and swallow him whole.

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* * *

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Carlton wasn't sure if he could go through with it.

He thought long and hard over the very few options he had. None of the options ended positively. Do nothing and let Spence get caught, because he _would_ eventually get caught, tell Shawn the horrible truth and hope the psychic doesn't do something stupid and destructive, or...

Of course, he would have to have gone with the most difficult option, and if he couldn't even say it, couldn't think it, how the hell was he supposed to go through with it?

After he had made his decision, he followed Spence one night and was led right to a storage unit that contained all of his supplies and tools of trade. Thankfully, Shawn's psycho little alter hadn't noticed him, so he was able to escape with the information unscathed. He made sure to call up Henry and tell him the location of the place and what number the storage unit was. He came back to the storage unit yesterday though, after swiping the key to the place off an unsuspecting Shawn, making copies, and he grabbed a few things, being careful to wear rubber gloves when handling everything.

It had all been tucked safely in a newly bought and DNA free duffle bag in the trunk of his car while he made his rounds to get the romantic dinner together. He felt that he at least owed Shawn a nice dinner. The psychic deserved that and so much more... so much more that he couldn't give him.

So while Shawn slept off the drugged wine, Carlton hauled the duffle bag in through the back door where his car had also been parked out back and out of sight. He forced his mind into a numb, emotionless state as he cleared off the biggest desk in the agency with extra long, rubber gloves covering his hands. He pulled the desk away from the wall and centered it in the middle of the room before kneeling down next to the duffle bag and unzipping it.

He paused as he stared at its contents for a moment before closing his eyes and focusing on his breathing. Emotions threatened to spill through the front gates of his mind, but he pushed them back and forced that monotonous feeling to return. Opening his eyes, he pulled the plastic sheet out of the bag. He had read enough reports to know exactly how everything needed to be set up.

As he got the room set up, his hands began shaking because he really couldn't do this, could he? So why was he even trying? Now would be the time to turn back, like a coward, and get out of the situation as if it never happened. He wanted to, he wanted to stop what he was doing, he wanted to escape the situation. Somehow though, his body kept going, completely set on his decision.

He taped up the last finishing touch to the scene, a piece of paper with a computer-printed message. Two words only: Too close.

Then it was done and the room was ready to go. All it needed was its guest of honor.

'_I don't think I can do this,_' he thought for what felt like the hundredth time that night as his feet dragged him back into the waiting room where the romantic dinner once was. He had taken it apart and put it all back into his car, leaving the waiting room just as he found it, and resting peacefully on the waiting room couch was Shawn.

Carlton stood before the sleeping psychic, just watching him. Admiring him and how completely innocent he looked. Exhaling deeply, he leaned down, his plastic poncho resembling a jacket crinkled as he did. Slipping one arm under Shawn's knees and the other under his back, he picked the psychic up bridal style and carried him into the office. He felt like his throat was closing up as he gently rested the younger man down on the desk and in the open, carefully placed body bag.

Even though his hands shook, he still found himself slipping off Shawn's shirt and shoes, he left his pants alone, wanting to leave him _some_ dignity, and even though he repeatedly told himself that he couldn't possibly do it, he bound the psychic's feet together with clear tape and wound plastic wrap around the desk and Shawn, pinning him down by his shoulders and waist.

His heart beat rapidly in his chest, ready to explode as he grabbed the handle of the sharp, double-edged knife.

'_I can't do this._'

"You can't do this," confirmed a confident voice.

Carlton's gaze snapped over to where Shawn lay, staring up at him with a smirk.

"You just don't have it in you, Detective," Spence continued. "Though I must admit, I'm impressed. You got a lot further than my dear father ever did."

"Spence," Carlton breathed, not really knowing what to say.

"Put the knife down, Lassiter," Spence said. "You're wasting both of our times with this little act of yours."

"I have to," Carlton said more to himself than to Spence as his gaze traveled back to the knife.

"But you won't," Spence said. "You love Shawn too much. You could never hurt him."

"By doing nothing, I'm hurting him," Carlton said.

"No, Shawn was doing just fine years before you entered the picture," Spence said. "If you, by some miracle, manage to go though with this, you'll be hurting him in the worse possible way. You'll be betraying him."

"I'm betraying him now by staying silent," Carlton countered.

"Go ahead and delude yourself for as long as you want, but both you and I know that you can't do this," Spence said. "Your emotions for my other half make you physically unable to."

It would be difficult, nearly impossible, and he'd probably never forgive himself, but he would never forgive himself no matter what option he chose. At least this way, he would be freeing Shawn from the madness and preserving the person that he is, that he's known as. Nobody, not even Shawn himself would ever know of his dark secret.

So Carlton tightened his grip on the knife as best as he could with a shaking hand, and he walked over to Spence, standing by his side. His heart beat faster as he slowly brought down the knife and made a quick small cut. He pulled the blade back, as if the action burned him. Spence's confident look quickly transformed into a poorly concealed look of shock.

He stared down at the small cut on his chest for a moment before looking back up at Carlton and saying with forced confidence, "A hesitant incision. They'll notice that. You may have set up my work space fairly well, but you don't have what it takes to do the actual work correctly. They'll know it's not my work and then they'll wonder why a copycat killer chose Shawn Spencer to kill."

Carlton could tell that Spence was beginning to panic, he was beginning to doubt his ability to talk himself out of the situation and he was grasping at straws. Even if the task force believed that it was a copycat killer, they would never figure out what actually happened. If anything, they'll suspect one of the many criminals Shawn had exposed in the past.

Bringing the knife down again and forcing his hand to stay steady, Carlton dragged the blade across tanned flesh until he formed a large circle on Spence's chest.

The number zero.

Pain shone though along with the shock in Spence's eyes as he slowly looked down at the new cut on his chest. Seeing the number zero, he choked out a laugh, "I think you're a little off on your calculations, Detective. The number is much higher than that."

Staring at the zero, Carlton wished that Spence would just stop talking. To hear Shawn's voice like that, with that mocking tone, just sounded so wrong.

"I could give you something for the pain," Carlton murmured.

Spence silently stared up at him for a moment, as if trying to read him. Apparently seeing what he'd been looking for, he seemed to wilt on the table, and said with a defeated tone, "No... It will be even more suspicious if the _Butcher_ took mercy on his victim. Besides, I always wondered... what it felt like. To be at the other end of the knife with all those emotions rushing through you and a desperate need to live. Would it feel the same for something like me?"

Spence lay on the table, silent again, staring off into space, and then finally he closed his eyes. A moment later, he opened his eyes, but they were different, they were groggy and confused.

"Wha..?"

He winced suddenly, as if just feeling the cut on his chest. Carlton watched with a feeling of dread as the younger man on the table seemed to take in everything around him as if for the first time. Eyes shining with pain and fear finally came to rest on the wary detective, eyes that could only belong to Shawn. Carlton mentally cursed Spence. It was either one last attempt at getting out of the situation of Spence's way of flipping Carlton the bird.

"Carlton, what the hell's going on?" Shawn asked incredulously. His eyes darted around the room once more, taking in the plastic, the message taped to the wall, and finally the knife held in the older man's hand. Brokenly, he asked, "You're the Santa Barbara Butcher? All this time?"

"I didn't want you to see this," Carlton said, neither confirming nor denying Shawn's realization.

"But," Shawn paused, as if trying to process the information. "That doesn't add up. It can't be true."

"Were you ever around me while one of the murders took place?" Carlton asked in a low tone.

"Yes!" Shawn cried. "You slept next to me... but..."

"You were asleep," Carlton said, finishing the psychic's train of thought.

"But.. I don't understand," Shawn said with watery eyes. "Why are you doing this? I had no idea it was you."

"You would have found out eventually," Carlton said, feeling his own eyes begin to burn with suppressed tears.

"So, what? You're just going to.. kill me?" Shawn asked, tears breaking free and sliding down his cheeks. "I thought you loved me."

"I _do_ love you. More than anything," Carlton said adamantly. "But... I have to do this."

Choking back a sob, Shawn asked, "Do I at least get one last kiss?"

With the knife in his right hand, Carlton leaned down and kissed Shawn more passionately than he ever kissed the psychic before, pretending all the while that they were safely back home and in bed, that Shawn wasn't crying into the kiss and that this wouldn't be the last kiss they ever shared. Then, with a steady and strong grip, he plunged the knife into Shawn's heart. He kissed away the psychic's pained cry and ignored the warm blood bubbling up around his gloved hand.

Shawn went still beneath him and Carlton pulled away, leaving the knife that was void of all fingerprints behind in the psychic. Shawn's eyes were closed with an eternally neutral expression on his face as his last breaths escaped him. His skin grew pale as the blood poured out.

Pulling out another knife, smaller than the first, Carlton cut away the plastic wrap and rolled it up into a ball to throw away later. Then, grabbing the zipper at the bottom of the body bag, he slowly zipped it up around Shawn, pausing only when he reached the psychic's face.

Holding back condemning tears, he thought sorrowfully, '_I'm sorry._'

He zipped the body bag the rest of the way up, leaving Shawn in peace.

'_I can't believe I did it.._'

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* * *

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Henry Spencer sat outside Psych in a dark blue car he borrowed from a friend. He had been borrowing a lot of vehicles lately so that he could tail Shawn and keep an eye on him.

Carlton's connection to his son had been made clear when he saw the dinner set-up through the window before the shades had been drawn. Sexuality had never really been a concern to him when he had Spence to worry about, and he had always kind of figured that Shawn didn't walk a completely straight path.

He knew what Carlton planned on doing that night and... he wasn't going to stop him. If Carlton could find the strength to go through with what he himself could never bring himself to do, he would be grateful that Shawn would finally be freed from the insanity.

Sighing, he pulled away from the curb and headed toward the storage units Carlton told him about so that he could dispose of Spence's things.

.

* * *

.

It was a partly cloudy day when the funeral was held, and the cemetery was packed with people. Up in the front row of chairs sat Shawn's parents, his mother had flown in from Florida, as well as Gus, Juliet, and several close relatives. The rest of the rows behind them was filled with people from the station along with people Shawn had met during those years he traveled the country on his motorcycle and people from previous jobs he had. Carlton sat in the very back row, feeling as if he had no right to be at the funeral to begin with. However, it would have been even more insulting to Shawn's memory not to come.

They had all just come back from the wake and were sitting in silence that was only broken by crying, waiting for the priest to come and deliver the final blessing. The wake had been nice with lots of colorful flowers, pineapples and even balloons. _Of_ _course_ Shawn would have wanted balloons at his wake to try and cheer everyone up. The building the wake had been held in had been even more packed than the cemetery was now. It had been open casket with Shawn all cleaned up and looking presentable, if not a little unnatural in the tux.

During the wake, Carlton had given brief condolences to Gus, Henry and Shawn's mother before escaping to the back of the crowd and staying out of the way. He just wasn't very good at offering comfort, especially when the guilt was practically eating him alive. One thing he was grateful for was that Gus and Juliet had each other to lean on so he didn't have to worry about them too much.

Gus especially. He had been the one to find Shawn the next day. Seeing his best friend in such a state had damaged something in Gus that would probably never be fixed again, but Juliet had been right by his side and together they made sure that neither one of them lost it completely.

The priest came and gave his last blessings. It rained off and on, but nobody seemed to mind getting a little wet. Vaguely, Carlton remembered hearing somewhere that rain during a funeral means that the deceased is happy. He hoped that was true. He wanted Shawn to be happy and free of burden.

When the priest finished his speech, people moved forward, forming a line, to say their last silent goodbyes to the now closed casket. Carlton moved to leave when a hand on his shoulder stopped him.

"Carlton," Henry said.

He turn back around to face the retired officer, not really knowing what reaction to expect.

"I just wanted to say thank you," Henry said quietly. "You did a good thing. He's free to be himself, completely himself. I know you cared about him, so... why don't you go remind him of that?"

Henry stepped to the side, giving Carlton a clear path to the thinning line of people. Feeling like he had a knot in his throat, Carlton stepped forward to the line and it wasn't long before he reached the casket. He stood there for a moment before resting his hand on the casket's smooth surface.

'_I love you and I'm sorry. I hope you can one day forgive me,_' he thought, pushing back emotions that threatened to explode and keeping a stoic expression on his face.

Sighing, his hand slipped from the casket's surface. He slowly made his way through the disbursing crowd and left.

.

* * *

.

Everything seemed to fall into place after that. There were no more murders by the Santa Barbara Butcher and there never would be. The task force had come to the conclusion that Shawn had been killed because he figured out who the Butcher actually was. This was further confirmed when the long sought after Rattlesnake Tavern list had been found hidden in the psychic's apartment. It was believed that he either figured out who the Butcher was based on the list or had found the list after finding out who the Butcher was.

As weeks turned into months with no more evidence and no more activity from the Butcher, the case went cold and FBI Agent Vardez was forced to return home. The morgue out behind the station had been dismantled and things were slowly returning to normal, or as normal as can be without the presence of everyone's favorite psychic. Gus still visited the station to see Juliet, but he closed down Psych and went back to working full time in the pharmaceutical business.

The Butcher case was still something that was reviewed and looked at, and because the 'Butcher's last victim' was such a personal attack on the station, the case would probably never be put to rest, but it wasn't top priority anymore. Carlton had turned much of the station's attention and manpower into finding all of the victims sold at Rattlesnake Tavern. He knew that Shawn would have wanted them to save all those people, or at least save as many as they could.

The buyers were brought to justice and the families of the victims they were too late to save were given peace. The victims they could save were given the best care and a support group had been organized for them.

A little over a year had passed when Carlton stopped at a small grocery store on the way to his destination. Heading to the registers with a pineapple in hand, his eyes caught the title of a book and he stopped in front of a magazine rack.

_The Santa Barbara Butcher:  
The Twenty-First Century's Biggest Unsolved Murder Mystery_

Carlton wondered how the book could be so thick when there was so much people didn't know about the case. He wasn't too surprised by the book though. Hollywood producers who were low on material had recently been swooping in on the case like vultures, grabbing up as much information as they could. They couldn't get too much though because many people at the station refused to comment on the subject. Henry also refused to sign any paperwork, so Shawn wouldn't be a starring character in any upcoming movies anytime soon. Glaring at the book, Carlton paid for his pineapple and left.

Pulling up in front of the cemetery almost twenty minutes later, Carlton stepped out of his car and made his way across the nice green grass. It was a beautiful day out with a clear blue sky stretching out above him. Carlton knew his way around the cemetery by heart and was standing before Shawn's polished granite headstone in no time.

Not caring about grass stains or getting his work clothes dirty, he plopped down in front of the headstone.

"Hey Shawn, I brought you something," he murmured, setting the pineapple down next to the headstone. "You know, just in case they don't have pineapple wherever you are." he sighed. "We recently caught another one of the buyers, I thought you'd like to know. The girl was alive too, she's at the hospital now recovering."

He fell silent and listened to the light breeze rustling the leaves on the nearby trees.

For the longest time, he had been so consumed by guilt that he couldn't even bring himself to come back to the cemetery. No amount of therapy could really help either considering he couldn't reveal the whole truth.

He had been plagued by nightmares that kept him up for days on end. In every nightmare, Shawn had been there; crying, yelling at him, blaming him for everything and killing him in return. He felt he deserved the blame and he deserved whatever punishment the psychic doled out.

Then one night, right in the middle of another torture session, the dream just stopped and Shawn was there holding him in his arms, assuring him that he was okay, that he understood now and that Carlton needed to stop worrying so much about it. They stayed like that for the rest of the dream, holding each other and enjoying a comfortable silence.

Carlton knew it was probably his guilty conscience giving him a break, but still, it helped. The day after he had that dream, he headed over to the cemetery for the first time since the funeral. Since then, he made sure to at least visit once a week and talk to the psychic.

"You know, I still wonder how you did all that psychic stuff," Carlton commented to the headstone. "I guess that'll just remain another elusive mystery about you."

His cell phone cheerfully called out from his pocket.

"Detective Carlton Lassiter speaking."

"Carlton," Juliet greeted, sounding excited. "We just got a lead on another buyer. How soon can you come in?"

"I'll head over there now," he said. "See you in a bit."

After slipping his cell phone back into his pocket, he stood up and brushed his pants off. Resting one hand on the headstone, he said, "I'll see you later, Shawn."

With one last glance at the gravesite, he turned and left the cemetery, leaving the pineapple behind to bask in the warm sun in the company of other mementoes people left behind. Flowers, a few pineapple themed trinkets, and one small inconspicuous strawberry.

.

* * *

_._

_This is the end my friends and it was fairly difficult to write. Endings are never easy. I would have liked to give you a happier ending than that, but I just couldn't come up with one. It had closure though, right? Hopefully. (u.u;) Credit on the idea of finding the victims sold at the Rattlesnake Tavern goes to **id0n'tkn0wwh0iam.** I would also like to thank all my wonderful reviewers._

_As for the strawberry, well, you can't honestly expect Spence to be around that long and not make friends, or at least, acquaintances._

_Comments are always appreciated!_


End file.
